Far-right personality ‘Baked Alaska’ arrested in Houston as part of Capitol riot investigation

WASHINGTON — Far-right media personality Tim Gionet, who calls himself “Baked Alaska,” has been arrested by the FBI in connection with his involvement in the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol, a law enforcement official said.

Agents arrested Gionet, 33, in Houston on Saturday, according to the official, who was not authorized to discuss the matter before the public release of a criminal complaint and spoke on condition of anonymity.

Gionet’s apprehension follows the arrests earlier in the week of a former Midland mayoral candidate and another Midlander for their alleged actions during the Capitol invasion. The names of all three, along with Larry Brock, Jenna Ryan and Troy Smocks in North Texas, are part of a growing list of Texans whom federal authorities have charged with crimes related to the violent mob scene.

Thousands of supporters of President Donald Trump stormed the Capitol as Congress was meeting to vote to affirm President-elect Joe Biden’s electoral win. Five people were killed, and federal authorities say that they’ve brought some 100 cases in federal court and the District of Columbia Superior Court in connection with the mayhem, and are still looking for at least as many more suspects.

Gionet faces charges of knowingly entering a restricted building without lawful authority and of violent and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.

Court documents don’t list an attorney for Gionet or say where he is being held. The jail in Harris County, which includes Houston, didn’t immediately reply to phone messages seeking further information.

FBI Special Agent Nicole Miller stated in an affidavit filed in the case that Gionet streamed live on the DLive platform for about 27 minutes from inside the Capitol and could be heard encouraging other mob members not to leave, cursing and saying things like “Whose house? Our house!” “Traitor, traitor, traitor!” “Patriots are in control,” “1776, baby,” “I’m staying,” and “I won’t leave guys, don’t worry.”

The video was later uploaded to Twitter and YouTube, the affidavit states. The New York Times reports that both platforms have banned Gionet.

At other points in the video, Miller states, Gionet makes comments such as: “We are in the Capitol building. 1776 will commence again,” “Unleash the Kraken. Let’s go!” “America first is inevitable. [Expletive] globalists.” and “Occupy the Capitol. … We ain’t leaving this [expletive].”

Inside an office, Miller wrote, Gionet picked up a telephone and acted out a purported phone call with Senate personnel. In another office, the affidavit states, he sat down on a couch and put his feet on a table, while urging other rioters not to break anything.

When told by law enforcement officers to move, Gionet said he was a member of the media and asked where he was to go, Miller says in the affidavit. Moments later, the document states, Gionet accused an officer of shoving him. The affidavit notes that no such physical action by the officer is seen on the video.

Gionet then verbally assails the officer, the document states, four times cursing him with “[Expletive] you” and saying, “You’re a [expletive] oathbreaker, you piece of [expletive].” Seconds later, he finally leaves the building.

Gionet’s video showed Trump supporters in “Make America Great Again” and “God Bless Trump” hats milling around inside the Capitol and taking selfies with officers who calmly asked them to leave the premises. The Trump supporters talked among themselves, laughed, and told officers and each other, “This is only the beginning.”

Gionet launched his career at BuzzFeed in 2015 but soon left after turning to the far right, the Reuters news service reported.

In a 2017 interview with Business Insider, he said he was given the nickname “Baked Alaska” because he is from Alaska and that he smoked marijuana at the time.

Ex-Midland mayoral candidate, 1 other arrested

Elsewhere in Texas, two Midlanders were charged Wednesday afternoon with two federal misdemeanors in connection with the riots, the Odessa American reported..

After the FBI arrested them Wednesday morning, Jenny Cudd and Eliel Rosa were charged — like Gionet — with knowingly entering a restricted building without lawful authority, a class A misdemeanor, and with violent and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds, a class B misdemeanor, the American reported.

The class A misdemeanor would carry up to a year in federal prison, up to a $100,000 fine and up to a year of supervised release, the American reported. The class B misdemeanor would be up to six months in federal prison and up to a $5,000 fine.

Cudd and Rosa were seen in federal court in Midland by U.S. Magistrate Judge Ronald Griffin, and both spoke to the judge throughout court proceedings, the American reported. Cudd’s attorneys appeared via Zoom from San Antonio and Alexandria, Va., while Rosa had no legal representation, the newspaper reported.

Rosa told the judge that he hasn’t had a job since moving to the U.S. in a bid to gain asylum from Brazil, the American reported.

Griffin released both suspects on their own recognizance, the newspaper reported. Neither answered questions from the media after the proceedings.

Cudd, a flower shop owner who the Midland Reporter-Telegram reported won 16% of the vote as a Midland mayoral candidate in 2019, is seen in a video posted to Twitter saying that she didn’t commit vandalism, then, laughing, adds, “but we did, as I say that, break down the, um, Nancy Pelosi’s office door” and claims that someone stole the House speaker’s gavel.

In a Jan. 9 report by Odessa CBS affiliate KOSA-TV, Cudd said that in her remark about breaking down Pelosi’s door, her use of “we” referred to the mob in general, and she denied committing any vandalism. She told the station that in the days since the riot, she had received death threats and that her business had been flooded with one-star reviews on Yelp.