Trump’s continued election lies keep blowing up supporters’ legal defense for Jan. 6

Capitol rioters have been blaming Donald Trump for their actions in the Jan. 6 insurrection, but his continued refusal to accept his election loss is keeping some of those supporters in jail.

The twice-impeached one-term president remains fixated on Republican efforts to get him back in the White House and made public statements applauding those unconstitutional efforts, which has undermined some of his supporters' arguments intended to win release from jail as they await trial, reported the Washington Post.

"The Court is not convinced that dissatisfaction and concern about the legitimacy of the election results has dissipated for all Americans," wrote Judge Emmet Sullivan in an April 20 ruling denying bond for a rioter accused of beating a police officer with a crutch and dragging him into the crowd. "Former President Donald J. Trump continues to make forceful public comments about the 'stolen election,' chastising individuals who did not reject the supposedly illegitimate results that put the current administration in place."

The judge cited Trump's Easter message, when he wished a happy holiday to "the Radical Left CRAZIES who rigged our Presidential Election," as well as a speech where the former president criticized Republicans who failed to keep him in power.

Sullivan cited those same comments when denying bond to physicist Jeffrey Sabol, who's accused of dragging a police officer down some steps and using a baton to hold him down, but now argues that he understands that Trump "lied to" supporters about his election -- but the judge was unmoved.

"There is ample reason to believe that fight is not finished for Mr. Sabol and others like him, making the threat of further violence present, concrete, and continuing," the judge ruled.

Other judges have cited Trump's public statements and right-wing media reports since the insurrection to keep his supporters jailed on charges related to the riot, including a Colorado man accused of driving to Washington with guns and ammunition and threatening to kill House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and other elected officials.

"The steady drumbeat that inspired defendant to take up arms has not faded away; six months later, the canard that the election was stolen is being repeated daily on major news outlets and from the corridors of power in state and federal government, not to mention the near-daily fulminations of the former President," wrote U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson, as she denied bond to the Colorado man.

Trump's public statements came up in another bond hearing for a man accused of throwing a hatchet and a desk during the riot.

"Unfortunately," ruled Judge Amit Mehta, "[the] political dynamics that gave way to January 6th have not faded."