Monday, January 09, 2023

SURPRISINGLY, THE FIRST JANUARY 6 PRISONER TO ANNOUNCE A RUN FOR CONGRESS ISN'T A RIGHT-WING SUPERSTAR -- YET

I've been saying for a while that many of the January 6 prisoners will run for Congress as soon as their sentences are completed.


And here we go:
... Derrick Evans, a former West Virginia state delegate who served three months in prison for his role in the Capitol attack, announced his official candidacy for Congress on Friday.

"Today, I am officially announcing my campaign for the United States House of Representatives," Evans wrote on Twitter. "I was previously held captive as a #J6 #PoliticalPrisoner. I'm proud to be America First & I will stand with the Freedom Caucus."

... On January 6, 2021, Evans—who was serving as a delegate of Wayne County at the time—livestreamed himself storming the building while shouting, "Derrick Evans is in the Capitol!" Three days later, he resigned from his seat. After pleading guilty to one count of civil disorder last March, Evans served three months at a federal prison in Michigan.
There's a lot going on in the world -- Brazil, the Speaker fight -- but I'm surprised that Evans isn't already a hero on the right. I'm surprised he has only 18,000 Twitter followers (though he claims to have 120,000 followers on Truth Social). I can't find a Fox story about his announcement, although he did score an interview on Newsmax that was beyond softball:


Still, I thought he'd be wingnut-famous by now. Which doesn't mean he won't be.

Evans seems as if he's from Republican central casting. He used to be an abortion-clinic harasser:
Derrick Evans walked with his phone out in front of him, camera facing forward, as he advanced on the patient in the abortion clinic parking lot. Surrounding the car, clinic volunteers tried to shield the patient with umbrellas and their own bodies. It was no use: On this February morning in 2019, Evans captured the patient on Facebook live, streaming to tens of thousands of followers....

Evans was a fixture at the clinic for much of 2019, with a reputation for harassment so severe that the clinic erected a 10-foot fence to deter him. A volunteer escort obtained a restraining order against him, accusing him of stalking her. When Evans was around — often accompanied by dozens of supporters — women would cry in the waiting room, said clinic patient Hunter Crites, afraid they’d be identified and screamed at as soon as they stepped outside.
He also -- naturally -- harassed people at Black Lives Matter protests and drag events.

His protest activity won him enough notoriety to get him elected to the West Virginia legislature. Then he joined the January 6 protest and resgned his seat after being arrested and charged. When he resigned, he said, "I take full responsibility for my actions, and deeply regret any hurt, pain or embarrassment I may have caused my family, friends, constituents and fellow West Virginians" -- but in the Newsmax interview above, he's clearly proud of what he did on January 6, claiming that he walked through an open door, thanked a cop for his service, and essentially did nothing wrong.

On social media, he has the usual right-wing obsessions:



Of course he believes (like many others on the right) that an on-air medical emergency of a young Canadian TV reporter was caused by COVID vaccination:


And, naturally, he supports the Brazil insurrectionists.


He'll be running against Carol Miller, a Republican who was just elected to her third term in Congress. In 2022, she won two thirds of the vote in both her primary and he general election, so she'll be tough to beat. But I bet he'll win, as will many more January 6 prisoners in the future.
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