H/T Scissorhead Skinny-D

The jury for Stewart Rhodes and the Oaf Keepers insurrection trial are now starting their deliberations:

The jury’s verdict may well address the false notion that the 2020 presidential election was stolen, coming soon after 2022 midterm results in which voters rejected Trump’s chosen Republican candidates who supported his baseless claims of fraud. The outcome could also shape the future of the Justice Department’s massive and costly prosecution of the insurrection that some conservatives have sought to portray as politically motivated.

Failure to secure a seditious conspiracy conviction could spell trouble for another high-profile trial beginning next month of former Proud Boys national chairman Enrique Tarrio and other leaders of that extremist group. The Justice Department’s Jan. 6 probe has also expanded beyond those who attacked the Capitol to focus on others linked to Trump’s efforts to overturn the election

The AP reports that the defense is trying to say (of course) that this is politics:

They say there was never any plot, that prosecutors have twisted their admittedly bombastic words and given jurors a misleading timeline of events and messages.

And the prosecution is asserting that their participation in the Coup Attempt was the result of a coordinated plan:

The jury will weigh the charges that the Oath Keepers were not whipped into an impulsive frenzy by Trump on Jan. 6 but came to Washington intent on stopping the transfer of presidential power at all costs.

The riot was the opportunity they had been preparing for, prosecutors say. Rhodes’ followers sprang into action, marching to the Capitol, joining the crowd pushing into the building, and attempting to overturn the election that was sending Joe Biden to the White House in place of Trump, authorities allege.

I have no idea where this is going. I generally try to not speculate on trials, as a sonofalawyer I learned early on that juries are peculiar beasts and not always predictable, and the story should never be written until after they’ve decided.

But boy-howdy, would I like to be a fly on the wall in the jury room. If the prosecution gets a win here, it is all but certain that they will move up a notch into the 4th Reich’s operational circles and start circling Lord Damp Nut hisself.