'QAnon Shaman' lawyer issues shockingly offensive defense of client's role in Capitol riot

Albert Watkins, the attorney for Jacob Chansley (perhaps better known as "QAnon Shaman"), spoke on the record with Talking Points Memo about his client's alleged role in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.
In the interview, published by TPM on Tuesday, Watkins used shockingly offensive language in an attempt to defend Chansley's alleged actions, saying Chansley has Asperger's syndrome, and asserting that other participants in the riot have intellectual disabilities that were to blame. "These are people with brain damage," he said.
He also claimed they were subjected to what he described as the most powerful propaganda campaign since Adolf Hitler's. Read the full, graphic passage from the TPM story below.
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Tim is a staff writer at The Week and has contributed to Bedford and Bowery and The New York Transatlantic. He is a graduate of Occidental College and NYU's journalism school. Tim enjoys writing about baseball, Europe, and extinct megafauna. He lives in New York City.
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