America Needs a Guy Fawkes Night for Jan. 6

Insurrection Day would only be celebrated by about half the country and instantly derided by the other half. That’s all the more reason to do it.

by Todd Zwillich

November 3, 2023, 1:19pm

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Rememberers only

This weekend, Brits of all ages will light bonfires, eat sausages and sweets, and have tonnes o’ fun burning effigies of this guy.

Or rather, this Guy. He’s Guy Fawkes, and he’s a coup plotter.

In the fall of 1605, a group of Catholic anti-monarchists in England hatched a plan to kill the Protestant King James. Thirteen conspirators plotted to murder the king, and most of Parliament with him. Incidentally, that’s a considerably narrower conspiracy than the one Donald Trump is accused of leading in Georgia.

The conspiracy’s aims were religious, but also procedural. King James had a plan to unite England, Scotland, and Wales into a kind of united kingdom, to be named later. November 5 was the day legislators were to meet to receive documents and certify the decision. Sound familiar?

But Mr. Fawkes was apprehended in the Parliament basement toying with about three dozen barrels of gunpowder and some fuses intended to stop the certification—but also to blow everyone up.

“This was an autonomous plot to create a coup,” my friend Ed Luce, the very British and very entertaining U.S. columnist for the Financial Times told me.

Alas, England in 1605 had no RICO statute for conspirators, nor much of a desire to give them fair trials. The plotters wound up with their heads on pikes.

Every November 5 for a few hundred years afterward, Guy Fawkes Day was a truly scary affair “especially if you were Catholic,” Luce says. Protestants would commemorate the holiday by insulting Fawkes for treason, but also by harassing Catholics.

These days, Guy Fawkes Day is a fun and family-oriented way to cozy up to a fire, or blow off steam. Sometimes the effigies deemed fit for burning are other, substitute hated figures.

“The last couple years it’s been Boris Johnson in more than one location,” Luce says.

But much more than the fun and games (and sausages), what got me thinking about Guy Fawkes is the national act of remembering events that shouldn’t be forgotten. It dawned on me that America needs to begin the work of ingraining Jan. 6 in the national memory.

Mike Johnson became Speaker of the House in such a hurry that no one had time to remember how hard he’d strived in support of Trump’s attempted coup. He’d worked on legislation, on legal efforts, and on propaganda, all to try to overturn a democratic election.

When a reporter tried to remind Johnson of some of these facts, Johnson’s friends told her to shut up. There would be no remembering on MAGA’s big day.

Meanwhile, the recasting of Jan. 6 as a tourist visit of peaceful, persecuted patriots, or a day of violence caused by the deep state, is one of Trump’s central authoritarian projects.

For now, the prosecutions and sentencings of insurrectionists are still happening. The conspiracy trials at the top of the plot are still in discovery. You’d have to be a programming director at Fox News to forget.

Yet Kevin McCarthy, recently deposed, premised his speakership on the extremely active forgetting he did after condemning Trump for sending the mob to the Hill. More than half of Republicans believe Trump had nothing to do with trying to overturn the election, a dangerously toxic mix of forgetting and delusion.

And what about a generation from now?

In the UK, commemorating Guy Fawkes’ treachery “was a political act, a renewal annually of a reminder of the threat of absolutism,” says Luce. “It took a long time to get it onto the statute books.”

Ed Luce and I agree that Insurrection Day—say, on the first Monday after Jan. 6?—would only be celebrated by about half the country and instantly derided by the other half. That’s all the more reason to do it.

“Bonfire Night wasn’t a unanimous event by any means. But it was an event that won. It wasn’t uncontroversial when it won. There are many events we’ve never heard of that have been tried and didn’t take hold. The fact that we were talking about this 420 years later shows that it symbolizes something that succeeded.”

July 4 has always been observed in America, but it didn’t take on its current, flag-proud form largely until after the Civil War, when half the country had real reason to celebrate union over tyranny and the other half didn’t. Stars, stripes, fireworks, and union won out.

“Political events are no different to family secrets. You cannot sweep things under the carpet and assume they’ll go away. That doesn’t work. It comes back,” Luce warns.

So how could America celebrate? I was squeamish about ritually burning Donald Trump in effigy. Resisting publicly fantasizing about harming presidents is a worthwhile norm. Maybe Jacob Chansley, the convicted dingus “Shaman” of Jan. 6 would be a good stand-in. Kids could throw miniature fire extinguishers at his likeness to commemorate MAGA rioters.

Ed Luce was more, well, British about the whole thing, and insisted that derision—and the symbolism of the insurrection—belongs only with one man.

“It has to be fun for all the family for this festival to take root. It has to be something the kids want to go and do. Charging at effigies with sharpened flag poles, that strikes me as something I would have wanted to do as a six-year-old boy.”

Get creative, America. Enjoy the traditional extra-well-done steak smothered in ketchup, but save the last bite and fling it at the wall! Play “Beast,” in which you pretend to lunge for the throat of the “disloyal” person in front of you. Encourage children to dress up as witches and hunt for eggs, all bright orange.

Just don’t ever, ever let anyone convince you to forget.

Cannon in camera

Ever since Donald Trump was charged with 91 felonies across four jurisdictions, he’s been focused on two things: Claiming persecution and victimhood at every turn; and delaying all he can in hopes of winning in 2024 so he can corruptly pardon himself or order his personal DOJ to drop the cases where he can (see below).

US District Judge Aileen Cannon seems inclined to help. Ever since Cannon, a Trump appointee with extremely little trial experience, made awful rulings to help out him after the search of Mar-a-Lago, experts have been on the lookout for signs she’s down to be even more useful to him. This week, Cannon gave them one.

Trump’s team has been arguing that they need to delay the process governing the sharing and use of classified evidence. The Classified Information Procedures Act (CIPA) has lots of steps when highly sensitive national secrets, like the kind Trump’s accused of illegally hoarding, are at stake. Each step is also an opportunity for delay.

Trump’s team went to court this week seeking a slowdown in CIPA deadlines, while Jack Smith’s team has been trying to call bullshit on their claims of inhibited access to discovery. Cannon stepped in to say she doesn’t think Trump’s documents trial can start in late May of 2024, because Trump’s federal coup case doesn’t start until March 4, 2024. Cannon hasn’t issued an order yet, but it’s clear she’s going to deliver the delay Trump’s been gunning for in every case. We should find out soon how far she goes.

Robe reversal

Looks like we’re going to get to see the details of Trump’s co-defendants’ guilty pleas in Georgia after all. Fulton County Judge Scott McAfee, who’s presiding over the big election interference RICO case, had ordered the statements of Sidney Powell, Ken Chesebro, Jenna Ellis, and Scott Hall sealed after they all pleaded guilty in recent weeks.

But then Judge McAfee thought better of it, announcing this week that he’s reversing himself and will unseal the records. That means we’ll soon get to see the apology letters Chesebro and Powell wrote as part of their plea deals. Ellis read hers aloud in court, where she teared up and threw Trump’s other MAGA lawyers under the bus for supposedly misleading her.

Crimer pays

Powell paid the restitution she owes Georgia after pleading guilty! “For three years now we’ve had people lying about our elections in Georgia,” Secretary of State COO Gabriel Sterling said while holding up Powell’s check for $2,700. “It’s a small down payment on what should be owed to the voters and people of Georgia.”

We’ll only know if the token payment and probation for the six misdemeanors Powell copped to will be worth it when we see what kind of information she offers on her co-conspirators.

Poetic un-license

John Eastman’s months-long disbarment trial in California is about to come to a close, and… he lost. Judge Yvette Roland yesterday made a preliminary finding of culpability against Eastman after months of testimony about his actions in and around the coup plot. The trial wraps tomorrow, then the judge has 90 days to decide on sanctions, including lifting Eastman’s law license.

Rioters’ corner

The defense wrestles — A convicted January 6 rioter had to be wrestled and subdued by federal agents after a judge ordered him jailed pending sentencing. Vitali GossJankowski was convicted on several counts from the riot, including assaulting police. He was back in front of Judge Paul Friedman after he violated his bond conditions with social media posts doxxing law enforcement officials.

After Friedman ordered him jailed pending sentencing, GossJankowski basically caused a scrum in the courtroom that required half a dozen US Marshals and FBI personnel to subdue.

Employee of the month — Prosecutors are asking for a 10-year sentence for a Trump political appointee at the State Dept. who was convicted of eight felonies including assaulting police after Jan. 6. Frederico Klein texted about Jan. 6: “I’m a Trump appointee. I better be there. It IS my job.” He’s set to be sentenced today in Washington.

No Bucks left to give

GOP Colorado Rep. Ken Buck has been all over the MAGA map. The conservative Freedom Caucus member voted against impeaching Donald Trump for sparking the Jan. 6 insurrection. He’s criticized Republicans’ quixotic quest to impeach Joe Biden. More recently, he refused to back Jim Jordan’s bid for House Speaker, warning that Republicans can’t thrive as a party with insurrection-enabling leaders at the top.

Then, more recently still, Buck turned around and enthusiastically backed Mike Johnson as Speaker, despite Johnson’s starring role in trying to overturn the election in the House and in the courts (to say nothing of his endorsement of the kinds of conspiracy theories that get right-wing networks sued).

Now Buck’s retiring, having just NOT used his substantial media clout to prevent a pro-impeachment, pro-election conspiracy Johnson speakership. Before he rides into the sunset, Buck’s back to decrying “self-serving lies” of Trumpist election conspiracies in the GOP. Okay!

Ineligible me

Buck also made an appearance yesterday in court as a witness in the suit seeking to disqualify Trump from the 2020 ballot in Colorado.

Court was in session all week in Denver. Petitioners, led by the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, called witnesses including a Capitol Police officer who testified to the violence of Jan. 6 and an extremism expert who described how Trump used his long relationship with extremist followers to green-light violence.

Indiana University law professor Gerard Magliocca, who I chatted with a few weeks ago, appeared to explain how the Constitution’s 14th Amendment “disqualification clause” applies to Trump even though he’s never been convicted of a crime.

The defense featured witnesses like Kash Patel, the Trump aide and extremely weird children’s book author who was unable to back up his now-familiar claim that Trump authorized 10,000 National Guard troops to protect the Capitol on Jan. 6. Even the acting Sec. of Defense Christopher Miller, Patel’s boss, said it didn’t happen (pg. 95).

As soon as the petitioners rested their case, Trump’s lawyers essentially tried to have it thrown out. But Judge Sarah Wallace refused, and said she’ll decide the case’s significant legal issues, presumably before Thanksgiving.

Meanwhile, the bid to disqualify Trump in Minnesota got underway yesterday. Michigan has an active case too, and Trump sued this week to try and ensure he is on the ballot there in 2024.

There are a ton of these cases that soon will be going all at once. Here’s a handy Section III, 14th Amendment case tracker so you never miss a motion.

Fill out in Penn.

Pennsylvania gives local county officials a lot of power over running elections. As such, Tuesday’s statewide local elections are a big deal. Whoever gets elected in pivotal swing counties in the pivotal swing state will have a lot of power over issues like the use of ballot drop boxes (and how many to use) and whether voters get a chance to correct errors on their absentee ballots before the ballots are disqualified.

That’s known as “ballot curing,” and it can impact tens of thousands of voters in a large state like PA.

There are also plenty of Trumpist candidates on the ballot (mostly, but not exclusively, in red counties) who’ve publicly gone full election conspiracist. Some Trumpist incumbents have already refused to certify their counties’ results until the courts ordered it.

For Richmond or poorer

Also Tuesday, a key but relatively unknown player in Trumpist election subversion efforts in several swing states looks like he’s about to get elected to Virginia’s House of Delegates. GOP election lawyer Tim Griffin worked to overturn Joe Biden’s win. Griffin worked for an organization that filed lawsuits in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. He also helped prepare affidavits claiming voter fraud in Michigan. A bunch of conservative Republicans have apparently been trying to warn the state party about Griffin’s status as an antidemocratic operative, to no avail.

“I’ve lost the trust of great men like Sean Hannity.”

— A not-very-rueful former member of the January 6 committee, Rep. Adam Kinzinger.

The stakes of 2024 — As Donald Trump became more and more desperate to cling to power after losing the 2020 election, fewer and fewer reputable lawyers were willing to risk their reputations to help him. So Trump turned to a sideshow of ethically freakish attorneys who were more than happy to lie, and help.

Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, Jenna Ellis, John Eastman, and the gang have already sacrificed their reputations, and they may be losing their licenses, and even their freedom, to serve Trump. And these are exactly the kinds of lawyers Trump wants to staff key positions should he regain the White House. Read about Trumpworld’s moves to reject the “squishes” at the ultra-conservative Federalist Society in favor of ethically unbothered and reputationally numb attorneys who will help him turn the federal government—and specifically the DOJ—into instruments of Trump’s authoritarian vision and his personal grievance.

Redactulous — In case you missed it, read the hilarious account of an indicted MAGA lawyer in Michigan encouraging a doofus Cyber Ninja in Arizona to lie about adulterated ballots in his taxpayer-funded “election audit” report, only to have said doofus attempt to redact the evidence of the conversations in such a way that anyone with Adobe can unredact them with a click. Hilarity—and charges! (for Stephanie Lambert, anyway)—ensue.