Now they had Judicial Watch had already obtained bodycam videos from the U.S. Capitol. We had sued. Essentially, Republicans came in, agreed with Judicial Watch and released all the videos, more or less. But there was this whole group of D.C. police videos from the January 6th issue that hadn’t been released. And what we did was we asked for the records under the D.C. Freedom of Information Act and the D.C. government, the police department, came back to us and said, oh, we can’t show you any of the faces who were recorded by these video cams and it’s going to cost you a million and a half, it’s going to cost us a million and a half dollars to blur out every face of the public that were captured on these videos.

We said that’s ridiculous. This was a public event. You don’t have to block out the faces. You don’t have to blur out the faces. So long story short, we’ve been in court. We were before a judge a few weeks ago. I guess it’s about two months ago now. And the judge issued a tremendous ruling, late last night actually, telling the D.C. government you can’t blur out the videos. You’ve got to release them. The privacy issues are not so significant that you have to blur out the videos. And so it’s a major victory for transparency.

So here’s our press release. That was two months ago. It was actually four months ago. The ruling follows a January 8th hearing before Judge Veronica Sanchez. When we filed the lawsuit, when did we file the lawsuit? We got back in 2024. So January 6th was in 2021. We sued for the D.C. body cams in 2024. And two years later we were able to get a decision out of the court to bypass this obstruction of releasing the videos. We couldn’t see any faces. On the videos, I mean that would be crazy. And we’d pay a million and a half dollars to be given videos that are practically speaking useless.

In its order, the court rejected the district’s argument that it could justify redacting under D.C. FOIA exemptions the faces and voices of all non-law enforcement individuals captured in the footage. And we’re talking about a thousand hours of footage, I think, according to, yeah, I think it’s a thousand hours. Yeah, a thousand hours of footage. The court found that while individuals appearing in the footage may have a limited privacy interest, that interest is minimal and does not outweigh the strong public interest in the disclosure. The court emphasized that the events of January 6th occurred largely in public settings, was widely recorded, were widely recorded, and remain a matter of significant public discussion.

Concerning the individual’s privacy interests, the court explained that the individuals present could not reasonably expect that their appearances would remain private. The circumstances from the court order, court ruling, the circumstances leading up to the events of the U.S. Capitol complex included a large public televised event at the National Mall. Individuals were gathered in a public arena. The crowd then marched to the U.S. Capitol complex, where members of Congress were partaking in the certification of the presidential election results live on television. The individuals on the body-worn cameras could not reasonably expect that their appearances on the cameras would remain private.

A person’s privacy interest is greater in the release of images and video footage that were taken without their knowing consent. Even though the individuals recorded on the subject’s body-worn cameras may not have consented to their images being recorded, they certainly had reason to believe that many law enforcement officers, as well as the surveillance cameras at the government-owned property, were recording them. Accordingly, during the events of January 6th, simultaneous media images from both inside the U.S. Capitol and around the U.S. Capitol complex were being broadcast, streamed, and uploaded while the individuals may not have all knowingly consented to the images being recorded.

They had reason to know they were. And she highlighted the public interests in this issue. The events of January 6th, 2021 have been the topic of much debate, discussion, and scrutiny in the public consciousness by not just the residents of the District of Columbia, but also of the nation. Body-worn camera footage of the events of the Capitol on January 6th could contribute significantly to the public’s understanding of the events that day and the Metropolitan Police Department’s actions. So what’s next? We’re going to push to get these documents out, these videos out, as quickly as possible.

The court concluded in balancing the privacy interests, which are little more than de minimis, meaning barely there, with the public interests, the public interest outweighs the privacy interests. The faces and voices of individuals captured by the Metropolitan Police Department’s body-worn cameras in January 6th are not exempt from disclosure. We won. Now we just need to get the videos. This is a major victory for transparency and the rule of law. As the court found, the American people have a right to see this secret DC Police January 6th footage, and Judicial Watch will now push for the immediate release of the videos.

Now, of course, this isn’t the only piece of litigation we have related to January 6th. We’ve been on the front lines investigating the January 6th issue, which, as you know, has been weaponized by the left to try to turn America into a one-party state by jailing anyone who dared to dispute the 2020 election or dared to exercise their First Amendment rights. We filed a lawsuit against the IRS to find out any abuses they were engaged in related to January 6th. And most famously, we’ve represented the family of Ashley Babbitt, who was killed, the only official homicide victim that day, and our lawsuit for her, her family, resulted in a settlement of nearly $5 million from the United States government.

Thank you, President Trump. Many other lawsuits and investigations and wild disclosures, including the fact that the CIA had teams present at the Capitol on January 6th. How did that happen? That’s not supposed to be, right? You have a suit about that now. So I’m hoping the government just, you know, stops the fighting of the DC government in this case and just gives us the January 6th doc. I mean, this is a straightforward FOIA lawsuit. Give us the videos, body-worn cameras from January 6th. What’s the secret? The court doesn’t think there’s any secret anymore.

So just again, tenacious work by our legal team leads in and, you know, a great decision by a judge. And this, I don’t know who this, Judge Sanchez, I think she’s a Biden appointee. You know, the rule of law can be applied by both Democrat and Republican judicial appointees. You may not know that from some of the fights we’re having in our courts, with our courts today, and the anti-Trump animus in the courts. But there are decisions now repeatedly that come down from judges of all political backgrounds and appointed by all sorts of various presidents that are quite sensible.

And it can work. The judicial system can work. We’re seeing that in this case. It’s great news, again, from Judicial Watches legal team. Thanks for watching. Don’t forget to hit that subscribe button and like our video down below. [tr:trw].

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