The arrest last week of investigative journalist Steve Baker has sent shockwaves through conservative media due to the charges themselves and the way he was treated upon surrendering to the FBI on Friday.
Baker, who is currently a correspondent for Blaze Media, attended the Jan. 6, 2021, protest on Capitol Hill and recorded footage of the event. Unlike dozens of mainstream media journalists who were also on the scene — and inside the Capitol building — on that day, he has been charged with multiple misdemeanors.
As he explained in an interview this week, his experience after finally being arrested more than two years after first hearing from the FBI was more akin to someone facing serious felony counts instead of the nonviolent charges against him.
“I thought I was mentally and emotionally prepared for this because I’ve followed too many of these cases not to have been,” he told Blaze Media founder Glenn Beck in an interview on Monday. “I’ve seen too many of these guys — even misdemeanor defendants, even misdemeanor independent journalists — marched before a magistrate in leg chains and the orange jumpsuit, so I thought I was ready for it until they put the leg chains on.”
Despite being “utterly and totally cooperative” with federal investigators throughout his ordeal, Baker said he was locked “in a cage with a meth dealer” and “guarded by U.S. Marshals with leg chains on” when he appeared before a judge.
A defendant facing felony charges on the same day, he explained, did not receive such restrictive treatment.
James Lee Bright, the attorney representing him, agreed that such treatment is all but unprecedented in his experience.
Baker concluded that the entire experience was coordinated “for the purpose of constructing a narrative for prosecution,” insisting that the charges are not supported by the facts of the case and were only filed in hopes that he would agree to “a quick plea deal.”
The House has released footage to Blaze Media of @TPC4USA in the Capitol on Jan. 6. In the five minutes we saw, there is no "disorderly and disruptive conduct" or "parading, demonstrating, or picketing." Just journalism. Wake up, America. Biden's FBI ARRESTED him for this. pic.twitter.com/fC7WSbJITi
— Glenn Beck (@glennbeck) March 1, 2024
While he has acknowledged that, if his behavior on Jan. 6, 2021, was technically against the law, then charges might be warranted, though he said “the crime has to be punished equally, so The New York Times, the Washington Post — every single journalist would have to be charged with that crime, right?”
