We’ve written about Elliot Resnick a couple times before regarding his work for WorldNetDaily — we caught him being afraid that immigrants were making America more liberal and less white, and he also insisted that getting a COVID vaccines was, somehow, “idolatry.” It turns out he was also spending part of that time taking part in the Capitol riot.
He was purportedly on assignment there for the Jewish Press, where he served as editor, “covering the rally and the rest of the day’s terrible events.” (The Jewish Press is linked to violent far-right rabbi Meir Kahane.) But it soon became clear that Resnick was an active participant to the point of interfering with law enforcement, grabbing and holding the arm of a Capitol police officer who was spraying a chemical irritant to prevent rioters from entering the building. Somewhere around that time, Resnick lost his editor job, presumably because video evidence blew up his employer’s initial defense of him. After ultimately pleading guilty, Resnick was sentenced in September to four months in prison and four months of home detention. His initial statement after sentencing ranted: “For now, I have just two comments: 1) The January 6 protesters are heroes. 2) The left knows no rules, it respects no boundaries.” Ironic, given how he refused to respect rules and boundaries at the Capitol.
As a right-wing ideologue convicted of a crime, Resnick is going to blame anyone but himself for his actions. He knew just where to do that — WND, publisher of his columns and whitewashers of Capitol riot participants no matter how violent. And that’s what he did in an Oct. 7 column, quickly moving into whataboutism:
Last month, a federal judge sentenced me to four months in prison and four months of home detention for my role in the events of Jan. 6, 2021. He also fined me $10,539. I am to report to prison Nov. 5.
Some Republican politicians defend January 6 protesters who walked into the Capitol that day though open doors, unimpeded by law enforcement. Virtually none, however, defend people like me who pushed their way in.
“We believe in law and order,” they say.
Well, so do I. But the Left doesn’t. During the summer of 2020, leftist mobs burned, looted and killed. They defaced historic buildings and tore down statues of American heroes. Did leftist leaders condemn them? No. Politicians like Kamala Harris actually donated money to bail Minnesota rioters out of jail. Others essentially said: “Look, we may not agree with rioting, but police in this country are so racist that we understand why people on the street exploded. Solve the racism problem and you’ll solve the rioting problem.”
He then blamed Republicans for not buying into his never-proven conspiracy theories about the election:
Right-wing leaders could have followed their example on January 6. They could have said, “Look we don’t agree with breaking into buildings, but this election was extremely shady. We’ve been begging you for answers for two months now, but instead of addressing the concerns of tens of millions of voters, you’ve basically called them kooks and given them the silent treatment. So, although we don’t approve of violating the law, we understand why the crowd at the Capitol reacted the way they did. Agree to an audit of the election and we’ll tell them to calm down.”
But right-wing leaders did nothing of the sort. Instead of using the chaos to their advantage – as the left did in the summer of 2020 – they condemned us and ran for the hills.
“But we’re not like the Left,” say Republicans. “We believe in following the rules.” I agree. In an ideal world, we should all strive to be model citizens. But if one side reveres the law while the other side mocks it, evil will ultimately triumph. As Brig. Gen. Percy Groves writes in “Behind the Smoke Screen,” “[I]f a pacifist people … are not prepared to oppose force by force, they will in the long run strengthen the rule of violence.”
From there, Resnick tried to whitewash his own behavior:
In any event, I had no intention of breaking the law when I traveled to Washington on January 6. I went because I thought – and still think – that many strange things happened on Election Day 2020. Nearly half the country (including 10% of Democrats) did as well. We screamed and yelled for two months. No one listened. The courts shut us out (mostly on technicalities), the media treated us as crackpots, and state legislatures were too cowardly to buck the entire media establishment, which had already declared Biden to be the winner. So the concerns of tens of millions of Americans were ignored.
I, and tens of thousands of others, walked to the Capitol on January 6 to attend a scheduled rally. When I arrived there, I saw no rally. I saw no cordoned-off area. All I saw was disorder. People were milling about everywhere. “Where’s the rally?” I asked myself. And then I noticed how humongous the Capitol building was (I hadn’t been to D.C. since I was a child). The section I initially approached didn’t even have windows. “The politicians won’t even know we’re here,” I realized.
As these thoughts were percolating in my head, I heard a woman say, “Let’s go to the other side of the building.” Still somewhat confused at what was going on, I, and a few others, followed her. When we got to the other side, I saw two massive sets of stairs ahead. Approaching the second set was a sea of Trump supporters. The stairs themselves were guarded by about five to 10 people.
At that moment, all I saw was opportunity. I knew five to 10 guards couldn’t keep back hundreds and hundreds of people. I also knew that if we wanted to make our voices heard – after two months of being given the silent treatment by the establishment – storming the Capitol was just about as perfect an opportunity as possible.
Resnick forgot to mention that he was supposed to be doing a job as a supposed journalist of covering events at the Capitol. He was not supposed to become part of the story.
After playing more whataboutism, he whined yet again that his bogus conspiracy theories were rejected:
“Respectable” right-wing leaders make a point of denouncing us, but storming a building in response to a likely stolen election is an under-reaction, not an overreaction. The Left burned and looted. We didn’t. In fact, not a single painting or statue in the Capitol building was damaged. Our aim wasn’t to destroy the building. Our aim was to save it.
Yet, we are the ones who are called domestic terrorists. We are the ones who must go through extra security at airports. We are the ones who go to prison. We are the ones whom the FBI is still tracking down nearly four years later.
And where are Republican and conservative leaders? AWOL.
Here’s the thing, Elliot: You broke the law, and you must face the consequences. Whether you believe you broke the law is irrelevant — facts don’t care about your feelings. Resnick’s exceedingly narrow definition of Capitol damage as limited only to painting and statues deliberately omits the fact that more than $2.7 million in property damage was in fact done to the building — and yes, that included paintings damaged by pepper spray and tear gas — and the total bill could ultimately top $30 million when mental health counseling for riot victims and other indirect costs are factored in.
Just to further prove he has not learned anything from his ordeal, Resnick concluded:
So leftists can openly defy the law on smoking marijuana, but Republicans can’t stomach the idea of their supporters storming a building to protest what might be the greatest political crime of all: stealing an election.
You don’t have to like violence or disorder. I certainly don’t. But the Right must stop trying to be holier than the pope. Liberals can whine about January 6 all they want. Our response should be: You brought it on yourselves.
Yes, he’s still clinging to the stolen-election fantasy despite offering absolutely no credible evidence to back it up — and he’s still blaming others instead of his own actions. Somehow we suspect Resnick’s prison term will not have the desired corrective effect on him, and he will continue to remain in a state of denial.