The Disturbing Historical Echo In Jack Smith's Trump Filing

A callback to the Brooks Brothers Riot, a seminal moment in the intimidation of election officials.

The scene at the Miami-Dade election offices, November 22, 2000

A federal court has now made public a 165-page filing from special counsel Jack Smith, which explains why Donald Trump should still be prosecuted for crimes related to his attempt to overthrow the 2020 election. Smith lays out evidence why this is true even given the recent ruling by the Supreme Court that presidents enjoy almost limitless immunity from prosecution for whatever crimes they choose to commit, so long as they do so by means of some official duty. There’s an important section buried in Smith’s filing with deep historical resonances that deserves extra notice. 

It jumped out at me because I have a particular obsession with the aftermath of the 2000 election, a series of events that created the Republican Party we see today. What I believe to be the seminal moment of that conflagration came to be known as the “Brooks Brothers Riot,” so named because of the collection of apple-cheeked thugs in khaki pants and striped Oxford shirts who carried it out. In 2020, at least two Trump campaign staffers remembered that event from two decades before, though only one of them seemed to appreciate its true significance.

This is a passage from Smith’s filing, detailing a conversation the day after the election between an unnamed campaign staffer on the ground in Detroit and an official whose name is blacked out. Reporters familiar with the details have identified the latter as Mike Roman, who was running Trump’s election day operations: 

In the immediate post-election period, while the defendant claimed fraud without proof, his private operatives sought to create chaos, rather than seek clarity, at polling places where states were continuing to tabulate votes. For example, on November 4, [Roman]—a Campaign employee, agent, and co-conspirator of the defendant—tried to sow confusion when the ongoing vote count at the TCF Center in Detroit, Michigan, looked unfavorable for the defendant. There, when a colleague at the TCF Center told [Roman] “We think [a batch of votes heavily in Biden’s favor is] right,” [Roman] responded, “find a reason it isnt,” “give me options to file litigation,” and “even if itbis [sic].”' When the colleague suggested that there was about to be unrest reminiscent of the Brooks Brothers Riot, a violent effort to stop the vote count in Florida after the 2000 presidential election, [Roman] responded, “Make them riot” and “Do it!!!” The defendant’s Campaign operatives and supporters used similar tactics at other tabulation centers, including in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and the defendant sometimes used the resulting confrontations to falsely claim that his election observers were being denied proper access, thus serving as a predicate to the defendant’s claim that fraud must have occurred in the observers’ absence.

We know nothing about the unnamed staffer in Detroit, but I picture them as young, with only a vague understanding of what happened in 2000. Perhaps all they knew was that there was some kind of chaos at a place where votes were being counted, and that’s a bad thing, so you wouldn’t want to repeat it. 

But Trump and his campaign absolutely would want to repeat it, and tried to, as Roman understood. In fact, a repeat of the Brooks Brothers Riot —  violent intimidation of election officials that prevented them from doing their job — was about the only thing that might have produced success.

The echoes of 2000

The Brooks Brothers Riot occurred on November 22, 2000, the day before Thanksgiving, at the Miami-Dade County election offices. All over the state, counties were rushing to complete recounts of their votes before the holiday, and Miami-Dade, the largest county in the state, was a place where Al Gore might have been expected to pick up votes (he ended up winning there by 6 points). There were over 10,000 ballots that machines had failed to read; in a hand count, many of these might have proven to be valid votes, perhaps with a stray mark that confused the machines, and if more them were Gore votes, that could be very significant in a state where Bush’s eventual margin of victory was just 537 votes.

So a group of GOP operatives, which included a number of staffers to Republican congressmembers, descended on the Miami-Dade offices. They pounded on doors and windows, physically accosted at least one election official, and made the officials fearful enough for their lives that they fled. The recount never took place.

To Republicans, the Brooks Brothers Riot was a triumph. It demonstrated their commitment, their passion, and their willingness to do whatever it takes to prevail. It highlighted the importance of the process of counting votes, and showed that that process could be manipulated, by force if necessary. It proved that if you are willing to go farther than your opponents and do things that the other side’s morals and commitment to democracy might prevent them from doing, you can win. Winning is what matters. And if you do win, before long the way you won will cease to be relevant, because you’ll have power, and power is what the whole game is about.

So in 2020, when that staffer told Romans that a repeat of the Brooks Brothers Riot might be in the offing, Roman’s response was essentially Hell yeah, that’s just what we need. He ordered his underling to create it. But for whatever reason, that didn’t happen. 

Over the next two months, Trump would rant and seethe and get angrier and angrier. In the end he created a different kind of attack on the election process, one even more violent and threatening. Unlike the Brooks Brothers Riot, the January 6 insurrection failed. But Republicans haven’t lost faith in the method.

Don’t be surprised if this November, we see versions of the Brooks Brothers Riot at election offices around the country, attempts to intimidate election officials into producing the outcome Republicans want, no matter what voters actually chose. In fact, that kind of intimidation is a key element of the GOP’s election strategy. They know it has worked before, and just might again.