the billing system is central to the unfettered operation of the pipeline

12:52 Sund receives word that a pipe bomb has been found at the Republican National Committee Headquarters, immediately adjacent to Capitol Grounds. Sund also testified that at the same time, “we observed a large group of individuals approaching the West Front of the Capitol.” He said, “It was immediately clear that their primary goal was to defeat our perimeter as quickly as possible and to get past the police line. This mob was like nothing I have seen in my law enforcement career. The group consisted of thousands of well-coordinated, well-equipped violent criminals. They had weapons, chemical munitions, protective equipment, explosives, and climbing gear. A number of them were wearing radio earpieces indicating a high level of coordination.” [snip]

3:37 The Pentagon sends its own security forces to guard the homes of defense leaders (source: AP reporting of internal DOD timeline). [snip]

5:02 Departure of 154 D.C. Guard members from the D.C. Armory in support of the U.S. Capitol Police. They arrive at the Capitol at 5:40, swear in with U.S. Capitol Police, and begin support operations. Walker, commander of the D.C. National Guard, says the Guard actually begins arriving at the Capitol at 5:20pm (in under 20 minutes after Walker finally gets approval at 5:08 p.m.). [snip]

5:45 Miller signs formal authorization for out-of-state Guard troops to muster and gives voice approval for deployment in support of the U.S. Capitol Police.

“We’re out on a ledge here,” Lambert remembers thinking. Both he and Blanchard hoped other news organizations would join them. “But it’s been radio silence,” Lambert said.

So, as part of WITF’s commitment to factual reporting, and because many who attacked the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 have said their goal was to overthrow the U.S. electoral system and government, we will use language in our reporting to show how elected officials’ actions are connected to the election-fraud lie and the insurrection. [snip]

We are not taking this approach lightly, and will apply it for lawmakers who took at least one of these three actions: signed on to a Texas lawsuit aimed at invalidating Pennsylvania’s election; signed on to a state House or a state Senate letter urging Congressional representatives to object to or delay certification; and voted against certification. The list of lawmakers is here. [snip]

We understand this may be an unusual decision for a news organization to make. But, these are not normal times. As disinformation and misinformation take more and more of a foothold in our social media feeds and dinner-table discussions, it is important for our journalists to adapt, as transparently as possible, to bring you the facts and not memory-hole the damage done to our democracy in the last three months.

A Texas appeals court on Thursday upheld a five-year prison sentence for a woman who was convicted of illegally voting even though she didn’t know she was ineligible when she went to the polls in 2016. The punishment for the Fort Worth woman, Crystal Mason, stirred national outrage because of its severity, prompting accusations that prosecutors were trying to intimidate Texans from voting.

Four years ago, Mason was on supervised release, similar to probation, for a federal felony conviction related to tax fraud. She didn’t know that Texas prohibits felons from voting until they finish their sentence entirely. Mason voted in the last presidential election at the urging of her mother and cast a provisional ballot when poll workers couldn’t find her name on the voter registration rolls. The ballot was never counted because Mason was not an eligible voter.

During her 2018 trial probation officials testified that they never told Mason she could not vote, but the appeals court said that didn’t matter. Mason was guilty, the court said, because she knew she was on supervised release. “Contrary to Mason’s assertion, the fact that she did not know she was legally ineligible to vote was irrelevant to her prosecution,” Justice Wade Birdwell wrote for a three-judge panel on Texas’ second court of appeals. [snip]

Because she was convicted of illegal voting while on supervised release, a federal judge had also sent her back to federal prison in late 2018, where she served several months. Her teenage daughter Taylor put off going to college to come home and run the household. The family depended in part on donations from a GoFundMe account. Since her conviction, Mason has become more politically active – she hosted a voter registration drive ahead of Texas’s primary.

On November 30, 2020 Mason's attorneys filed a petition with the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals to review the case.[11] The petition asserts that the lower court ruling violates Texas law and conflicts with the Court's previous ruling in DeLay v. State. The conviction of Former Republican U.S. Rep. Tom DeLay was thrown out on the basis that an individual must "know" that their conduct violates the Election Code. Andre Segura, legal director for the ACLU of Texas was quoted in a press release saying "The same result must apply to Crystal—a woman who was not aware she was ineligible to vote and had no reason to risk her liberty." On March 31, 2021 the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has agreed to consider Crystal Mason's appeal.[12]