My January 6 Story – Part I

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    By Elliot Resnick

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    Bang!  Bang!  “FBI!  Open up!”

    I don’t wake easily, but the sounds were brutal.  It was 6:00 a.m., March 16, 2023.  Twenty-six months had passed since I had pushed my way into the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021 to protest what half the country – including 30 percent of independents and 10 percent of Democrats – thought was a dishonest election.  I had made no attempt to hide or leave the country.  The FBI could have easily called me and requested that I turn myself in at a time and place of its choosing.

    But it didn’t.

    Instead, it sent 10 agents with a door buster to my mother’s apartment at 6:00 in the morning.  The pounding was so violent I feared the door would come crashing down, so I quickly threw on a pair of pants and headed toward the noise.

    I knew I wasn’t guilty of anything other than upsetting power-hungry Democrats, but I also knew FBI agents don’t play games.  Obey, or you just might be the victim of a “tragic shooting” thanks to your hands not being visible or too close to your pockets.  So upon opening the door, I immediately raised my hands in a classic surrender stance.

    I expected the FBI to storm inside the apartment.  Instead, they stood there, and I stood there – and the door slammed in their face.

    Apparently, the FBI had never arrested anyone whose front door shuts if you don’t hold it open.  It was ridiculous, so I tried again.  “I’m going to open the door slowly,” I said through the closed entrance.

    “Yes, open it slowly,” an FBI agent barked.

    I did so and again raised my hands.  This time, an FBI agent instructed me to step outside into the hallway.  As I did, I saw at least one FBI agent pointing a gun directly at me.

    I stepped into the hallway and looked back toward the closing door.  “It’s going to shut again,” I said.  At the last second, an FBI agent took notice of this obvious fact and tried holding the door open.  Too late.  It shut in his face.

    “Do you have a key on you?” an FBI agent asked me.

    “No.”  How would I?  I just woke up 30 seconds ago.

    “Where does the building’s superintendent live?” he asked me.

    “I’m not telling you,” I replied.  It was bad enough that the FBI had woken me up at 6:00 in the morning.  I wasn’t about to have them wake up the super too.

    “So you’ll be responsible for us breaking the door down,” he said.

    Before I really had a chance to reply, someone realized that superintendents generally live in the basement or first floor and went to get him.  Meanwhile, an FBI agent grabbed me roughly, pushed me against the wall, and started cuffing me.

    “This is really unnecessary,” I objected.  “This is a political persecution.”

    At the same time, though, I felt my legs start to shake slightly.  I immediately reproached myself:  You did nothing wrong.  They’re the criminals, not you.  But a person can’t easily shed 40 years of belief in law and order.  In my idealistic mind, handcuffs are placed on criminals, not innocent people.  I knew that wasn’t true that morning, however, and within seconds of my silent speech to myself, my legs stopped shaking.

    My yarmulke meanwhile had fallen off and I asked one of the FBI agents to please put it back on my head.

    “Do I have permission to touch it?” he asked.

    I thought the question odd, but I said “Yes,” and my yarmulke was restored to its proper position.

    The FBI then took me further down the hallway where we all waited for the superintendent to arrive.  At that point, a female agent whom I’ll call Jessica started chatting with me cheerfully as if I were her best friend – as if she and her colleagues hadn’t just woken me up at 6 a.m. and clanked handcuffs around my wrists.

    I couldn’t make heads or tails of it.  I tried to be courteous, but how merry could I be with someone who had just arrested me for the “crime” of insisting on the integrity of U.S. elections?  Black people can burn and loot to protest non-existent police racism without penalty, but I can’t enter the Capitol to hector a group of politicians without being jolted out of bed 26 months after the fact?

    The FBI strangely never told me why I was being arrested, although I of course knew.  A man next to Jessica – who identified himself as a liaison between the FBI and NYPD – told me I would be back home that evening and that my experience for the rest of the day depended on me.  If I was cooperative, it would go easily.  If I wasn’t, it wouldn’t.  I told him I would cooperate – of what use would resistance be? – but he could hardly expect me to be happy at being arrested for political reasons.

    The superintendent finally arrived.  He seemed a bit shellshocked.  I’m sure he didn’t expect to see a group of brawny FBI agents in his building.  Nor me as their target.  I wanted to reassure him, so I said, “I’m being arrested for political – not criminal – reasons.”

    His shell-shocked expression didn’t change, but he opened the door to the apartment and I was brought back inside.  At this point, I was told we would be driving to downtown Manhattan and the liaison asked me where he could find my clothes.  I told him they were on a chair in my room and among them was a religious garment.

    “Is that your tzitzit?” one of the FBI agents asked me.

    It was indeed, although I have no idea how the FBI knew that word.  Do they arrest that many Orthodox Jews?  I hope not.

    “Can I touch it?” the liaison asked.

    Once again, I said “Yes.”

    When my clothing arrived, I asked, “Should I dress quickly or slowly?”

    “Why would you dress slowly?” the liaison asked me.

    “I don’t want to make any sudden movements that might be misinterpreted,” I replied.

    “Don’t worry,” he said, “The agents are well-trained.”

    While I was getting dressed, the agents looked around the living room.  “This is quite an impressive library,” one of them said.  It was my late father’s.  Eight bookcases, filled from floor to ceiling, six with sefarim, two with works of philosophy, history, and political thought.  I imagine the FBI doesn’t often raid the homes of intellectuals.

    I finished getting dressed and we headed downstairs.  Jessica placed a coat over my shoulders.  “This way, no one will be able to see that you’re handcuffed,” she said.  During the ride downtown, Jessica continued to be extraordinarily friendly.  “Are you comfortable, Mr. Resnick?  Is there any particular radio station you’d like for us to put on for you?  Do you have enough room for your legs?”

    I thought perhaps she was trying to soften me up – playing the good guy in a good cop/bad cop routine in the hope that I would be more willing later to talk about my activities on Jan. 6.  Several people over the previous two years had recommended that I get a lawyer just in case this day ever arrived.  I had always declined to do so.  I had no desire to think the worst or spend money hiring a lawyer “in anticipation.”  Besides, I knew I would be safe if I ever was arrested as long as I kept my mouth shut.  And so, no matter how nice Jessica was, I knew one thing: I wasn’t going to talk.

    After about a 45-minute drive, we arrived at a federal building downtown.  Jessica told me I would be taken through the back to save me embarrassment.  Was she being sincere, I wondered again, or just buttering me up?  I was taken up an elevator and down a hallway – always being instructed exactly where to stand and walk.  We finally arrived in a small, mostly empty room.  Awaiting me there were several kosher snacks.

    “I made sure to only get you food with kosher symbols on them,” Jessica said cheerfully.

    I was then asked if I’d like to call my mother.

    I didn’t.  Thankfully, my mother wasn’t home when I was arrested.  (I had moved back home to watch over my mother after she suffered a minor stroke in 2019.)  She was babysitting for my sister’s children and was blissfully unaware of my predicament.  I wanted to keep it that way until she had driven my nieces and nephews to school and was on her way back home, which I calculated would be around 8:45.

    I did need to daven, though, and told the agents that.  Once again, the agents were extremely courteous for reasons I don’t fully understand.  Perhaps they were trying to assuage their conscience by packaging their evil deed in as polite a veneer as possible.

    “How much time do you need?” they asked me.

    I told them I first needed to wash netilas yadayim and that Shachris takes around 20 minutes, but, if necessary, I could do an abridged version in 10 minutes.  They gave me 20.  They also offered to leave the room to give me privacy.

    Either before or after I davened – I don’t remember – Jessica and the FBI-NYPD liaison laid down a thick stack of papers on the desk in front of me.

    “We’ve spoken to many people about what you did on January 6,” Jessica said.  “We have their side of the story.  The only side of the story we don’t have is yours, and we would really like to hear it.”

    Here is the trap, I thought to myself.  But to my surprise, before I could even say that I prefer to exercise my right to remain silent, Jessica added, “But if you don’t want to speak, you can just sign here, indicating that you decline to comment.”

    That’s easy, I thought.  I signed.

    The rest of the day was rather boring.  Someone took my fingerprints, another person took my mugshot.  I eventually called my mother, told her what was going on and asked her to please cancel two podcast interviews I had scheduled for that day.

    Later, the man who would be my lawyer over the next 18 months – a real mentch – visited me.  Since I had lost my job as chief editor of The Jewish Press two year earlier, I had no steady income and therefore was thought to qualify for a free lawyer (a “federal defender”).  I had started a podcast – “The Elliot Resnick Show” – hoping to build a large enough audience that I could start earning some money from it, but the podcast was still in its infancy and I wasn’t earning anything yet.  “Your savings are a bit on the high side,” my lawyer said after I had filled out a financial form, “but hopefully the court will approve my appointment since you have no source of income at the moment.”

    My lawyer handed me a dossier outlining my “crimes.”  (I read it, I must admit, with some measure of pride.)  On top of the first paper was the name of the FBI agent who had researched and compiled the dossier.  It was Jessica.  I couldn’t figure it out – I still can’t figure it out to this day.  At one point, I even asked her point blank, “Why are you being so nice?”

    “I try to treat everyone as if they were my brother,” she replied.

    But isn’t it weird to play the part of caring sister to someone you’re trying to lock up?

    For lunch, Jessica ordered me three slices of pizza from the kosher Bravo’s store downtown.  She told a fellow FBI agent who asked me a question after I washed netilas yadayim that I’m not allowed to talk until I take a bite from the pizza.  How does she know so much about Judaism? I wondered.  Does she encounter so many frum Jews in her line of work?

    Eventually, I was taken across the street to a courthouse and placed in a cell to await my turn to appear in front of a judge.  I thought it would be five minutes.  It was more like an hour.  Three times, someone came to my cell to instruct me to stop humming and drumming my fingers.  I was disturbing the proceedings in the courtroom, he said.  Well, don’t lead me to believe that I’ll be somewhere for five minutes instead of an hour and I won’t sing or bang, I wanted to reply.

    In the courtroom, I faced a judge who told me I could return home but I would have to post a $50,000 bond and surrender my passport.  (I ultimately needed to do neither of these.  New York insists on these steps, but my case hailed from DC, where the rules in this respect are more liberal.)

    “I’m sorry about the reporters here,” my lawyers whispered in my ear nodding toward the benches behind us when we sat down.

    I didn’t mind.  It’s not every day that you get arrested for standing up for principle.  I considered my arrest a badge of honor.

    The proceedings were rather technical.  Thankfully, they included a humorous note – for me anyways.  Both my lawyer and the prosecuting lawyer received a statement of facts outlining my crime.  The judge asked if anyone had an objection to it.  My lawyer said no.  The opposing lawyer said the following, in all seriousness:

    “Your honor, we don’t presume to know the defendant’s pronouns, but we believe he uses ‘he’ and ‘him.’  One of the paragraphs here, however, refers to Mr. Resnick as ‘she,’ so we would just like to emend the text so that it reads ‘he’ instead of ‘she.’”

    I thought the judge would burst out laughing, or at least smile.  She did nothing of the sort.  Her expression was serious, as was that of the lawyer who made the ridiculous woke request.  It didn’t even make sense.  If you don’t presume to know my pronouns, why are you presuming to know them?  Maybe I do, in fact, prefer “she.”

    In any event, the request to fix the typo was granted, and I was released shortly thereafter.  Luckily, I had thought to ask the liaison that morning to grab the subway MetroCard lying on my desk.  Otherwise, I’m not sure how I would have gotten home.

    “Don’t speak about your arrest on your podcast,” my lawyer advised me as we parted ways outside the courthouse.

    But what had precipitated my arrest?  What exactly did I do on January 6, 2021 that merited an FBI raid at 6:00 in the morning with a gun pointed at my chest?

    (Click here for Part II two of this series.)

    Elliot Resnick, PhD, is a VINNews podcaster, the former chief editor of The Jewish Press, the author of five books, and the editor of three more.  His most recent publication is In a World Gone Mad: An Appeal for Sane Thinking on Israel, Trump, War & More.

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    50 Comments
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    Educated Archy
    Educated Archy
    3 months ago

    Arresting him was very wrong. It was simply a protest that got of hand just like the so many free Palestine protests. Nevertheless a Jew in golus should not participate in rowdy protests. It’s not our place to mix in. There is an argument to be made that we need to protest against the free Palestine crazies who directly put our life’s at danger. If we don’t protest our voices won’t be heard. And in fact it’s a shame that Agudah and the charedim refuse to at least make a Yom tefila in the city . I hear excuses that it’s a safety concern. But so what we need to take that risk . If cops don’t let we need to sue for freedom of speech till we get permission. That all being said, we don’t belong at protests or rallies that are political at nature and aren’t directly abour our issues

    Ari
    Ari
    3 months ago

    What a terrible ordeal for R’ Resnick. If only Trump had pardoned him along with all non-violent J6 protesters, they all would have been saved from much grief and anguish. After all, on his way out of office, Trump pardoned the corrupt Democrat mayor of Detroit, rappers and other criminals. Yet he did not pardon R’ Resnick and the other patriots who were simply protesting a rigged election. If he had, this entire sad article would have never been written.

    Noach
    Noach
    3 months ago

    Is there a reason why your’re censoring many of the original posts including the federal link to the charges?

    Accuracy Matters
    Accuracy Matters
    3 months ago

    Umm – your “puh[ing] your way into the Capitol” on October 6 was a crime – don’t try to make yourself out to be some sort of hero “defending the integrity of elections”. No, it was not an insurection, and no, having the FBI come after you, a self-important but non-violent shnook, was overkill – but you are no innocent, and some level of consequences, even if only a deferred prosecution agreement, were absolutely warranted. Some of the riot’s leaders, of course, absolutely should have faced more severe consequences – January 6 was a riot, not a peaceful protest.
    And stop arguing that the BLM riots justify what you participated in – they were dead wrong and should have had the book thrown at them – but the January 6 rioters should have had the same. The fact that one was not treated properly does not justify the other – two wrongs don’t make a right.

    Tshuva
    Tshuva
    3 months ago

    Wow. This is no fun.

    Announces
    Announces
    3 months ago

    First of all ur not allowed to say that a frum fbi agent should rot in jail yes a agree that they are corrupt but let’s face the facts he did something wrong and now he is paying the price and yes I believe that Jessica the fbi agent that treated him nicely is Jewish

    Gollupp
    Gollupp
    3 months ago

    Don’t let liars call this an insurrection. Not one person charged was charged with insurrection. ZERO.

    M k
    M k
    3 months ago

    I personally agree with his political position

    But he still broke the law and he is a convicted felon, who has done wrong, even according to Torah, and I don’t think his articles should be posted as if he is a marter

    Realistically
    Realistically
    3 months ago

    It’s scary how the justice department has been politicized. I don’t think they understand the damage they are doing to the country by undermining peoples faith in the justice system.

    lazy-boy
    lazy-boy
    3 months ago

    what a life….

    Iyyar5
    Iyyar5
    3 months ago

    Every Fbi who was involved in terrorizing Elliot Resnick שליט”א, a friend of mine, should rot in גיהינום for all time, as should all the looters from summer 2020.
    Anyone who dares vote for the מכשפה immediately needs to be evaluated by a competent psychiatrist.