It is the “sleeper” case that could upend the nation's most closely watched criminal trial. And how the U.S. Supreme Court decides the fate of an obscure Capitol riot defendant will have immediate legal and political implications for the former and perhaps future president.
The justices will hold oral arguments Tuesday in the appeal of Joseph Fischer, one of more than 300 people charged by the Justice Department with “obstruction of an official proceeding” in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection in Washington.
That charge concerns the disruption of Congress' certification of Joe Biden's 2020 presidential election victory over Donald Trump.
Special prosecutor Jack Smith also filed an obstruction charge against Trump, which is among four charges facing the presumptive 2024 Republican presidential nominee. His trial in that case was scheduled to begin March 4, but the court's decision Supreme Court hearing this case and a separate dispute over Trump's presidential immunity claim have delayed the proceedings indefinitely.
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Donald Trump, left, and Jack Smith (Getty Images)
THE CHARGES
Previously, a federal judge dismissed obstruction charges against three criminal defendants from Jan. 6, ruling that it did not cover their conduct on Capitol grounds. Those defendants are former police patrolman Fischer, Garret Miller of the Dallas area and Edward Jacob Lang of New York's Hudson Valley.
Fischer's appeal was the one that the high court accepted for final review.
U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols, appointed by Trump in 2019, found that prosecutors stretched the law beyond its scope to inappropriately apply it in these cases, ruling that a defendant must have taken “some action with respect to a document.” , record or other object” to obstruct an official proceeding under the law.
He concluded that the statute in question focused on tampering with evidence and did not apply to those allegedly engaging in “aggressive conduct,” such as participating in a riot.
The Justice Department challenged that ruling, and a federal appeals court in Washington agreed with prosecutors that Nichols' interpretation of the law was too narrow.
“The vast majority of courts interpreting the statute have adopted the natural and broad reading” of the provision, the three-judge appellate panel wrote, “applying the statute to all forms of obstructive conduct that are not specifically covered” by that provision.
Other defendants, including Trump, are separately challenging the use of the charge, but not as part of the current appeal to the Supreme Court.
The relevant statute (18 U.S. Code Section 1512(c)(2)) of the Corporate Fraud Accountability Act, part of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, states: “Whoever corruptly… obstructs, influences, or prevents any official proceeding, or attempts to do so, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for not more than 20 years, or both.”
Congress passed the law in 2002 after the Enron financial and accounting scandal. Executives at the Texas-based energy company were accused of fraud and the company eventually went bankrupt.
Judge Nichols in his ruling in the Miller case cited then-Sen. Biden, who referred to the new provision at the time as “making the destruction of documents a crime.”
President Biden speaks at a campaign event at Pullman Yards on March 9, 2024 in Atlanta. (Megan Varner/Getty Images)
COMPETITING CLAIMS
Both the government and Fischer, who at the time was a North Cornwall Township police officer in Pennsylvania, offer contrasting accounts of their actions on January 6, 2021.
His lawyers in his appeal to the high court say Fischer “was not part of the mob that forced the halt of election certification; he arrived on the Capitol grounds long after Congress recessed.”
And while he admits to entering the Capitol building and pushing his way through the crowd, Fischer says he also kindly returned a pair of lost handcuffs to a U.S. Capitol Police officer. After authorities pepper-sprayed him, the defendant says he left the complex just four minutes after entering.
But the Justice Department says Fischer “can be heard on the video yelling 'Charge!' before pushing his way through the crowd and entering the building. Once inside, the petitioner ran toward a line of police officers with another rioter while he yelled “a profanity.”
And the government points to text messages he sent just before attending the “Stop the Steal” rally where President Trump spoke and the subsequent march to the Capitol.
“Take the democratic Congress to the gallows,” he said in one post, and “They can't vote if they can't breathe…lol.”
Fischer has pleaded not guilty to several charges, including disorderly and disruptive conduct; assault, resist or impede law enforcement officers; civil disorder; and obstruction count. His trial is pending.
The Supreme Court on February 28, 2024, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File)
His legal team argues that impeding or affecting an official procedure is too ambiguous, as applied to Fischer's conduct on Capitol grounds.
“That definition encompasses lobbying, advocacy, and protest, the same mechanisms that citizens use to influence the government. These are all forms of political speech that the First Amendment protects.”
But the administration says Congress, in enacting the statute, intended it to apply broadly, including “engaging in corrupt conduct to obstruct judicial, agency, and congressional proceedings.”
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“The evidence in this case would show that on January 6, 2021, the petitioner and other rioters corruptly attempted to prevent Congress from counting the certified Electoral College votes in the joint session,” government lawyers said.
Some legal scholars say the conservative high court may be cautious about giving the government too much freedom.
“Prosecutors love obstruction and conspiracy statutes because those statutes are very broad and can be applied in a variety of circumstances to cover all types of conduct,” said Thomas Dupree, a prominent appellate attorney and former top U.S. official. Bush's Justice Department. .
“The Supreme Court is going to look at what Congress was trying to do when it criminalized these things. Did Congress really intend for these laws to go that far? And can you take a statute that was enacted to address, for example, corporate crimes and apply it to what happened on January 6?”
A scene from the January 6 riot at the United States Capitol in 2021. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez, File)
WIN FACTOR
It is unclear how a Supreme Court ruling in the Fischer case would affect Trump's separate prosecution for alleged election interference. If Fischer wins, the former president could ask federal courts to formally dismiss his own obstruction charge.
That could trigger a new round of separate legal appeals that could return to the Supreme Court for final review.
Nine days after oral arguments in the Fischer case, the justices will hold a public session to debate whether Trump enjoys absolute immunity from prosecution for conduct in office as he allegedly seeks to overturn the results and certification of the 2020 election.
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That has indefinitely halted Trump's criminal conspiracy and obstruction trial.
The separate challenge on the obstruction charge would also likely push the timeline well into next year.
The case pending in the high court is Fischer v. US (23-5572). A ruling is expected in early summer.
