With legal representation like this, who needs enemies? Seriously, Jacob Chansley aka “Q-Anon Shaman” needs to fire Albert Watkins:

The attorney for alleged insurrectionist and “QAnon Shaman” Jacob Chansley says that his client and other accused Capitol rioters were uniquely vulnerable to being misled by former President Trump’s lies. “A lot of these defendants… they’re all fucking short-bus people,” Albert Watkins told Talking Points Memo. “These are people with brain damage, they’re fucking retarded… But they’re our brothers, our sisters, our neighbors, our coworkers—they’re part of our country. These aren’t bad people, they don’t have prior criminal history. Fuck, they were subjected to four-plus years of goddamn propaganda the likes of which the world has not seen since fucking Hitler.”

Watkins has unsuccessfully tried to have Chansley granted pretrial release on the basis of his unusual dietary needs, and his client having been fed misinformation by Trump. Some experts told Talking Points Memo that the emphasis on Trump’s role in inciting the riot may be a smart tactic for getting lighter sentences.

So, what’s worse? Being treated as though you’re evil for your support of President Donald J. Trump, or just brain-addled? Watkins is doing his client no favors by making him look easily influenced. Watkins is also doing him no favors by shifting between his client being an innocent dummy and the Dalai Lama.

In multiple interviews, Watkins speaks of Chansley as a peace-loving, gentle, innocent soul who just wanted to believe in the President’s words, wouldn’t hurt a fly, and helped to quell the unrest. In the same interviews, Watkins speaks of Chansley as a manipulatable idiot who was simply following orders from President Trump. It’s not a good look, let alone a good legal defense.

As I said back in January, Watkins is a high-profile ambulance chaser, so it comes as no surprise that he represents his client this way.

From a Newsmax interview:

The lawyer for the “QAnon shaman” from the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol disturbance admitted his client is guilty of trespassing during the breach of Congress, but little else except for “winning the best costume contest of the day.”

Attorney Albert Watkins called Jacob Chansley a peaceful man who was one of the most visible people during the Jan. 6 breach for his bare-chested appearance in bison horns and fur. He was photographed by many sitting in the Senate president’s chair with an American flag. Watkins said he actually helped defuse the situation by calling for the protesters to disperse and leave.

“There’s 10 million miles of video footage of my client,” Watkins said on Newsmax TV’s “Greg Kelly Reports” on Wednesday. “None of it displays anything that is resembling violent, destructive. He wasn’t armed. He wasn’t shrouding his identity. In fact he was the most visible person there. He won the best costume contest of the day.

“But he also helped police. He called for everyone to leave once President (Donald) Trump announced that it was time to go home. This man is a peaceful man. He’s a gentle man.”

“It’s not the sign of someone you need to be afraid of.”

So was Chansley manipulated or a peacemaker? Did Chansley have full agency in his decisions, or did Trump plant evil thoughts in his brain? If I were a judge, I’d be giving this attorney the side-eye.

One thing that Watkins is consistent on is the narrative that Democrats and their brainwashed base want you to believe: Trump incited these people to violence. While his client was just a “trespasser”, the rest of the lot were driven to rage by a President who, according to Watkins, can’t even string words together.

It’s the Millennium version of “The devil made them do it,” and to the Left’s fevered imagination, Trump is that devil. The problem is this: the longer they allow this circus of treating those who did no more than trespass, damage property, and take selfies as if they are all violent seditionists, the more the narrative crumbles. Contrasted against the riots of 2020 that produced billions of dollars in property damage and multiple deaths of innocent people, it’s like comparing a stubbed toe to Stage 4 pancreatic cancer.

As my colleague streiff wrote:

Ever since the riot in the US Capitol on January 6, the Democrats and their media fluffers have tried every way possible to tie President Trump and the GOP directly to the rioters. The idiot impeachment of President Trump AFTER he left office was predicated on the idea that remarks made by President Trump at a rally at the other end of the National Mall were the cause of the riot, never mind that Capitol security was breached 20 minutes before the inciting words were uttered. Not only have the Democrats and the media been harping on this, but so have the VichyCons at National Review, the Bulwark boys, the pedophile wing of the NeverTrump movement, and others.

I feel for Chansley, and all the individuals who are caught up in this fabricated witch hunt to disenfranchise a president’s legacy, and marginalize and destroy anyone who dared support him. I doubly feel for them if they have an attorney like Albert Watkins as their counsel.

When Watkins thought he could influence Shampeachment II, he took to media, including this podcast. Kudos to Adam Klasfeld for actually doing the work of a journalist and poking holes in Watkins’ arguments.