Proud Boys expecting 'civil war' before Jan. 6, witness says [View all]

WASHINGTON (AP) — The month before the riot at the U.S. Capitol, members of the Proud Boys were growing increasingly angry about the outcome of the 2020 election and were expecting a “civil war,” a former member told jurors on Tuesday as he took the stand in the seditious conspiracy case against the group’s former leader.

Matthew Greene testified in the case against former Proud Boys national chairman Enrique Tarrio and four lieutenants under a cooperation deal with the government after pleading guilty to storming the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, with fellow extremists.

Greene told jurors that the Proud Boys’ conversations became more heated as December 2020 wore on and challenges to President Donald Trump’s election loss were unsuccessful. The Proud Boys were getting “ready and willing for anything that was going to happen,” Greene said, adding that the group saw itself as “essentially the tip of the spear.”

“We were openly expecting a civil war at that point,” Greene said.

Greene is the first Proud Boys cooperator to take the stand in the case accusing Tarrio and associates of plotting to forcibly stop the transfer of power from Trump to President Joe Biden. He was the first Proud Boys member in December 2021 to publicly plead guilty to conspiring with others to stop Congress from certifying the Electoral College vote. He’s cooperating with prosecutors in the hopes of getting a lighter sentence.




https://apnews.com/article/politics-united-states-government-district-of-columbia-proud-boys-donald-trump-a7e5b9f263868239c06c3826b49bf0c0