The Supreme Court heard arguments Tuesday morning in the case of Fischer v. United States, one of the many criminal cases arising out of the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol. Like defendants in a large subset of those cases, Joseph Fischer was charged, among other offenses, with obstruction of an official proceeding under 18 U.S.C. 1512(c)(2). Fischer’s case in the Supreme Court challenges whether the events of that day can be prosecuted using this obstruction statute.
Most of the justices seemed dubious, or at a minimum concerned, about the Department of Justice’s very broad interpretation of the statute allowing it to sweep in the kinds of conduct that Jan. 6 encompassed. If the court rules for Fischer, his case will automatically apply to all Jan. 6 cases that include a Section 1512 charge and radically change those cases, including the prosecution against former President Donald Trump in D.C. In virtually all instances, such a ruling would likely require that the Section 1512 charges be dismissed outright.
There are a number of different obstruction statutes in the U.S. code, but none of the others apply to Jan. 6. And Section 1512 itself is largely aimed at other sorts of conduct. Subsection (a) prohibits killing or using physical force or threats of force against individuals to affect their testimony or evidence they might have. Subsection (b) prohibits the same sort of obstructive conduct where the person uses intimidation, corrupt persuasion, or misleading conduct toward the witness.
Subsection (c), at
