The ruling comes from two of three judges on a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, one an appointee of President Biden and the other appointed by President Donald Trump.
A third judge, also appointed by Trump, dissented.
Members of Congress have suggested that Trump could face prosecution under the same charge. A federal judge in California has written that Trump “more likely than not” committed the obstruction crime by summoning a crowd to march on Congress.
The crime covers anyone who “corruptly alters, destroys, mutilates, or conceals a record, document, or other object, or attempts to do so, with the intent to impair the object’s integrity or availability for use in an official proceeding; or otherwise obstructs, influences, or impedes any official proceeding, or attempts to do so.”
Prosecutors have used the obstruction charge against nearly 300 people they say intentionally tried to stop Congress from formally counting electoral votes for Joe Biden on Jan. 6. The charge has been used successfully against members of far-right groups such as the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys, including individuals who never went inside the Capitol. At a trial last fall, three associates of Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes were acquitted of engaging in a seditious conspiracy but convicted of obstructing an official proceeding.
But one judge, also a Trump appointee, threw a wrench into those prosecutions by finding that the law is limited to documentary evidence. The law was written during the Enron scandal, when the company’s accounting firm shredded documents after learning that the Securities and Exchange Commission was investigating.
That situation “had nothing to do with actions like protest that don’t relate to evidence,” defense lawyer Nicholas Smith said at oral argument in December. “But … acts of protest that don’t involve investigations and evidence [are] not obstruction of justice.”
An attorney for the government responded that this “limited reading” goes against the “plain text of the of the prohibition.”
Judge Florence Pan, writing for the court, agreed, saying that a “cramped, document-focused interpretation” is dubious.
While federal guidelines generally call for far lower sentences, obstruction of an official proceeding carries a potential penalty of up to 20 years in prison. A misdemeanor conviction for trespassing or illegally demonstrating in the Capitol garners a sentence of a year at most.
Smith and other defense attorneys argued that there is no line that distinguishes the felony charge from the misdemeanor. Prosecutors say the word “corruptly” explains it, distinguishing people who entered sensitive areas of the building or directed followers to stop the vote count from those who wandered in with the crowd.
Spencer S. Hsu contributed to this report.
