President Donald Trump’s local MAGA-influenced U.S. Attorneys are running into a conundrum—federal grand juries in Washington, D.C., won’t indict on their cases. In recent weeks, juries in Washington have returned at least half a dozen cases brought under former judge, now attorney for the District of Columbia, Jeanine Pirro, the Trump-appointed U.S. Attorney for D.C. Including the rejection of the Attorney’s Office’s attempt to bring felony charges against a woman accused of making threats against the President—the latest sign of pushback from residents in the city overtaken by federal law enforcement.
It’s rare for grand juries to refuse to hand up indictments in the federal system. Still, it has happened in at least seven separate instances across five cases since Trump ordered his crackdown on Washington roughly a month ago, according to the Associated Press.
One of the latest examples was Monday, September 1, when defense attorneys for Nathalie Rose Jones, a woman accused of threatening Trump online, filed a motion in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, highlighting that a grand jury had returned “no bill.” Jones had been charged under two federal statutes, including making threats against the president.
At the start of August, Nathalie Rose Jones, a 50-year-old resident of New York, posted on Instagram, labeling Trump a “Nazi,” “terrorist,” and calling the administration a “dictatorship,” according to documents from the Department of Justice.
Days later, while in D.C. to attend a march, Jones agreed to an interview with the Secret Service, in which she called Trump a “nazi” and directly said to the agents that she would kill the president to “avenge” the lives lost during the pandemic, if necessary. However, she clarified that she had no desire at the time to harm Trump. Following this, letters to the judge from longtime friends of Jones explained that she had a history of mental health issues.
Pirro has experienced several legal setbacks in the past few weeks. This case in particular was painstaking, as Pirro attempted to indict the woman at a grand jury three times, failing each time.
