Cole Tomas Allen claims he didn't do it. For now, anyway.
The former Teacher of the Year and Cal Tech graduate entered a formal plea of not guilty this morning in federal court after his arrest at the White House Correspondents Dinner earlier this month, where Allen allegedly attempted to assassinate Donald Trump and others in attendance. A federal grand jury issued an updated indictment that included a crime caught clearly on video, the shooting of a Secret Service agent at the checkpoint. Allen made a morning appearance to re-enter his plea, along with a couple of motions worth discussing:
The man charged with allegedly attempting to assassinate President Donald Trump at a White House Correspondents’ Association dinner last month pleaded not guilty at a Monday arraignment in federal court.
Cole Tomas Allen, 31, pleaded not guilty to all charges against him, including attempting to assassinate the president of the United States, in connection with the April 25 incident at the Washington Hilton Hotel. ...
Allen was initially charged with attempting to assassinate the president, transportation of a firearm and ammunition through interstate commerce with intent to commit a felony, and discharge of a firearm during a crime of violence. On Tuesday, a federal grand jury indicted him on a new charge in the shooting of a Secret Service agent.
Let's start with the plea first, which may look absurd given the plethora of self-incrimination that Allen has already provided, including a manifesto written just before his idiotic assault. Normally, a suspect accused of a felony would enter a not-guilty plea even if he or she planned to confess at some point, allowing the lawyers to negotiate a deal with prosecutors. There's no benefit at this stage to admitting to the crime, since a conviction will lead to a life sentence. Why make prosecutors' jobs easier?
At some point, Allen and his attorneys will change that plea after leveraging it for sentencing considerations, if any can be gained. Or maybe Allen will push through to trial as a means to amplify the grievances in his manifesto, although that seems redundant. M-SNOW amplifies those on a regular basis.
It's not just M-SNOW, however. The Protection Racket Media has its own narratives to push, and this will throw a few more drops of gasoline on those. Almost since Trump held a presser after the aborted attempt on his life, progressives have created conspiracy theories around this assassination attempt, as well as roping in the other two attempts as part of a Unified Field Of Lunacy Theory. In this case, the leading argument from the paranoia corner argues that Allen was a patsy for Trump as an excuse to ... build his ballroom.
It's not that these media outlets are claiming that these conspiracy theories have merit. However, they are delighted to keep promoting their existence as a means of promoting even more kooks to come out of the woodwork. Not all of the loons are from the Left, either, but most are. The Washington Post clucked its tongue at the loonies, but they're also happy to provide oxygen for their claims:
Law enforcement is still investigating the attack, but no evidence has surfaced that the Trump administration staged the shooting. Yet the conspiracy theory is spreading fast online, building into a widespread narrative that President Donald Trump and his associates planned the event to drum up support for the president, his party — and the planned White House ballroom, an event space he has argued could prevent future attacks.
A popular theory claims that Trump staged the event to generate public support amid falling approval ratings and predicted Republican losses in the midterm elections. Some say it’s intended to build support for his ballroom project, which has come under criticism for bypassing congressional approval. ...
About a fifth of the left-wing and liberal influencers and politicians who posted about the shooting used conspiratorial language, according to a Post analysis of social media posts and podcasts.
Some onlookers interpreted a clip of a Fox News White House correspondent getting cut off live on air as evidence of the network attempting to stop her from exposing the incident as staged. (The correspondent, Aishah Hasnie, corrected the narrative in an X post. “Our calls were dropping, because there is barely any service in that ballroom,” she noted.)
It's not just the WaPo, either, although John notes in our next post that the Post has returned to the point yesterday. More than a few national media outlets went into "explainer mode," layered with mildly disapproving tones, to keep the lunatic fires burning, including NBC News, Newsweek, PennLive, and with more disapproving tones, Fox News and the New York Post. Most of this burned off a couple of weeks ago (although The Bulwark tried framing it as a right-wing phenomenon last week), but every appearance Allen makes will get the media's conspiracy-theory engine cranking again.
One development today bears more notice, though. Allen's lawyers want to disqualify the US Attorney's office from prosecuting the case and potentially the Department of Justice, too. The issue here isn't a conspiracy theory allegation, but a potential conflict of interest that may have some meat to it:
Allen’s lawyers are asking U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden to disqualify at least two top Justice Department officials from direct involvement in prosecuting him because they could be considered victims or witnesses in the case, creating a potential conflict of interest.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro were attending the event when Allen ran through a security checkpoint and fired a shotgun at a Secret Service officer, authorities said. Defense attorney Eugene Ohm said the defense likely would seek to disqualify Pirro’s entire office from involvement in the case.
McFadden didn’t rule from the bench on that question but asked Allen’s attorneys to elaborate on the possible scope of their recusal request.
Would this create a problem for prosecuting Allen? Possibly; it's at least unusual for prosecutors to insist on remaining in place when they can be called as witnesses, and especially when they are technically victims in the crime itself, at least potentially. However, neither Pirro nor Blanche has indicated that they will personally prosecute this case, so whatever conflict exists isn't particularly acute. As long as the actual prosecutors of record were not in the ballroom at the WHCA dinner, a federal judge likely won't force a change to a different US Attorney office to handle a case as straightforward as this one. At worst, McFadden may ask Pirro and Blanche to recuse themselves from management of the case, but he's not going to force the entire DoJ or Pirro's entire office to recuse.
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