In a 21-page lawsuit, prosecutors offered more detail than previously known about the alleged planning, training, and coordination that some members of the Oath Keepers undertook after Trump lost the November election.
In it, they ask a federal judge to detain Jessica Watkins, whom they describe as the leader of an Ohio-based militia affiliated with the Oath Keepers, and says she holds extreme views that the Biden presidency poses an “existential threat” and actively recruited people participate in a coup d’état.
Prosecutors quote her on November 17, days after the election, telling a recruit that if Biden were president, “our republic would be over. Then it’s our duty as Americans to fight, kill and die for our rights. “
More than 200 people have been charged in connection with the riots.
Thursday’s detention memorandum for Watkins suggests that some of Trump’s most ardent supporters believed he was trying to get them to act.
In the memo, prosecutors say Watkins exchanged texts with another co-defendant and other unidentified contacts about coordinating a “rapid response force” (QRF) that would be backed up with weapons on January 6 if necessary.
(We can have mace, tasers or night sticks. QRF staged, armed, with our weapons, outside the cityShe wrote, noting that the armed team would be “ outside DC with guns, waiting for … orders to enter DC with Trump’s permission. ”
Watkins is in prison awaiting trial, has yet to make a plea and could not be reached for comment. The court does not list a lawyer for her.
FBI investigations have focused on members of far-right extremist groups who may have plotted to take over the Capitol and halt the election certification process.