Michael Brock, a January 6 defendant, is complaining that there's no way he can get a fair trial in Washington, D.C., reported CBS News' Scott MacFarlane. The reason? His jury pool is unlikely to have bricklayers or plumbers in it.
Brock, who lives in Mississippi, is accused of using a metal rod to beat D.C. Metropolitan Police officers as the crowd tried to force its way toward the Capitol complex.
"D.C.'s working class, blue-collar, or tradesman population is relatively small compared to D.C.'s households filled with professional class and civil servants," said the filing. "It seems that the city's bricklayers, plumbers, construction framers, seamstresses and cab drivers may reside disproportionately in Maryland or Virginia. Consequently, the District's jury pools prove to be overburdened by establishment households filled with lawyers, professionals, civil servants and bureaucrats who are most likely to detest former President Trump and Trump's supporters."
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Washington, D.C. does have a higher college graduation rate than any state. However, it is also home to many working-class laborers too. Brock's real motivation may be to avoid a jurisdiction where voters backed President Joe Biden overwhelmingly. But this isn't in and of itself grounds for moving a case. Jury selection typically already excludes people who can't put aside political bias.
Despite this, many other January 6 defendants have tried to get their trials moved from D.C., arguing that they would have a fairer trial in their own home states. Trump himself has threatened to try to invoke a similar tactic in the federal election charges against him, with his lawyer suggesting they could move for the case to be relocated to more "diverse" West Virginia.
So far, January 6 defendants' efforts to move their trials have been unsuccessful.
