Man who stormed U.S. Capitol charged with threatening to assassinate Rep. Ocasio-Cortez

A Dallas-area man who joined a violent mob that stormed the U.S. Capitol earlier this month has been charged with making a demise menace in a social media put up towards Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

Garret Miller, 34, of Richardson, Texas was arrested earlier this week on a number of fees associated to the Capitol riot, according to a federal complaint.

Miller’s lawyer, Clinton Broden, instructed CNBC that the fees towards his consumer had been upgraded to incorporate a menace cost on Tuesday, a day earlier than he was arrested in Richardson. The upgraded cost got here comparatively quickly after the preliminary criticism was filed in Washington, D.C. federal court docket, Broden mentioned.

The opposite fees embrace coming into or remaining in any restricted buildings or grounds with out lawful authority; violent entry and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds; obstructing or impeding any official continuing and sure acts throughout civil dysfunction.

The menace cost towards Miller is predicated on the declare by prosecutors that he threatened Rep. Ocasio Cortez, D-N.Y., throughout state traces on social media. It carries a most potential sentence of 5 years in jail.

Miller wrote “Assassinate AOC” in a Twitter put up, based on the criticism. Miller additionally allegedly posted about coming into the Capitol constructing on his Instagram account and admitted that he “had a rope in [his] bag on that day.”

Miller additionally threatened a Capitol Police officer who shot lifeless a girl attempting to breach the Capitol constructing in the course of the riot. “We going to come up with [the USCP officer] and hug his neck with a pleasant rope[.],” Miller mentioned, based on the criticism.

“Mr. Miller regrets the actions he took in a misguided effort to point out his assist for former President Trump,” Broden mentioned. “He has the total assist of his household and has all the time been a law-abiding citizen.”

“His social media feedback mirror very ill-considered political hyperbole in very divided occasions and will definitely not be repeated sooner or later,” Broden continued. “He seems ahead to placing all of this behind him.”

Broden added that he does not imagine there’s proof that Miller deliberate to hold out the threats.

Miller is because of seem Monday for a detention listening to in Dallas federal court docket. Prosecutors have mentioned they need him detained pending trial, however Broden mentioned he’ll argue for Miller’s conditional launch pending trial in Washington.

Ocasio-Cortez responded to the criticism detailing Miller allegedly bragging on-line about his function within the riot, writing in a tweet: “On one hand you must chortle, and on the opposite know that the explanation they had been this brazen is as a result of they thought they had been going to succeed.”

Ocasio-Cortez has beforehand mentioned she feared for her life during the riot and members of Congress had been “almost assassinated.”

“I didn’t know if I used to be going to make it to the tip of that day alive, and never simply in a basic sense but additionally in a really, very particular sense,” the Democratic consultant mentioned in an Instagram Stay video on Jan. 12, with out elaborating the main points.