A judge has acquitted a defendant charged with trespassing at the U. S. Capitol on 6 January, 2021. An official of the Capitol Police admitted under oath that the Capitol Police had admitted people into the building, and Judge Trevor McFadden found that it was reasonable for the defendant to have believe that the Capitol Police had allowed him to enter and that the Department of Justice had failed to prove otherwise.

Politico has noted

the verdict could be viewed as a message from McFadden to prosecutors that pursuing criminal charges against nearly every demonstrator who entered the Capitol on Jan. 6 was unwise and that resources should have been trained more intensely on those accused of violence or of conspiring to block the electoral vote count.