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ACTIVISM

Sullivan started attending Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests from June 2020. According to Lex Scott, the founder of Black Lives Matter-Utah, none of the activists knew him before that.[7] He also has engaged in anti-government commentary, calling for burning down the current political system and replacing it with another system, so it benefits the people and grants them more freedoms.[3]

Sullivan founded Insurgence USA, a group participating in the protests against police violence. The group's web site says it was founded "in response to the George Floyd tragedy" to "end police brutality" and "empower and uplifting black and indigenous voices".[10][non-primary source needed] Sullivan organized events in Provo, Utah. In one event, he invited the Proud Boys to speak to the black activists.

He also organized another event, a counter-protest to a pro-police event on June 29, 2020,[11][12][13][14] where a Back the Blue protest was held consisting of a number of vehicles driving around the Provo police station. Sullivan and others organized a counter-protest blocking vehicles. At the protest, shots were fired into a vehicle and one driver was injured. One man, Jesse Taggart, was charged with attempted murder.[15][16] According to a police affidavit after the shooting, Sullivan damaged vehicles and cooperated with Insurgence USA to recruit protesters for a protest. Sullivan indicated that he thought the driver who was shot at was trying to run over protesters.[17][18]

On July 22, 2020, Sullivan held a solo, armed protest at the Utah State Capitol, carrying an AR-15. The protest lasted a couple of hours, during which he was confronted by twenty armed men from Utah Citizens' Alarm.[19][20]

Sullivan was treated with suspicion in left-wing activist circles. Labor activist Talia Jane said he is "reviled throughout the activist space", and noted he had been escorted from a December 12 event at Black Lives Matter Plaza after he was identified.[3] Many suspected him to be a double agent working for law enforcement. An activist from Portland warned people not to trust him, after he got local activists arrested in September 2020 by leading them down a wrong route and into a police kettle. Anonymous activists from Seattle published a memo in November 2020 accusing him of being an agent provocateur, pointing to his getting activists arrested or exposing their identities. Activists noted that his brother is a pro-Trump supporter, a supporter of the "Blexit" movement and speaking at a Proud Boys rally. After a man was shot in Provo during the protests in summer 2020, a right-wing militia started appearing to police Sullivan's group. During one of his rallies, Sullivan handed the microphone to a Proud Boys member. According to Lex Scott, he [Sullivan] told them [Proud Boys] that his group [BLM-Utah] wanted to work with them [Proud Boys], which led to other left-wing activists refusing to work with him [Sullivan]. He [Sullivan] later got his group firearms training. As he [Sullivan] began carrying assault rifles to protest, this invited hostility from both the right and the left.[3][7]

Others believe Sullivan exploited the racial justice movement for self-gain. Lex Scott [of Proud Boys] said that Sullivan seemed to have "a death wish" as he thought it would be "cool, or amazing, if he was killed at a protest and it started a revolution". She [Lex Scott] has also denied Sullivan is a member of BLM-Utah and expressed suspicions of his seeking fame, adding he [Sullivan] never attended any BLM meetings nor worked alongside them to advance their agenda. The Salt Lake Tribune reporter Robert Gehrke also stated that he had been selling merchandise and indulging in self-promotion on many websites; his Insurgence USA website sells protest-related gear, such as black clothing, gloves, and gas masks, branded "bloc gear collective".[3][7] In Signal chat groups, Sullivan would discuss himself from various sock puppet accounts.[6]

J. Hoberman, a film critic writing in Artforum, reviewed Sullivan's film Shooting and Storming of the US Capitol in Washington DC, describing it as "cinema as forensic evidence" and comparing it to the Zapruder film of the Kennedy assassination.[21] Parts of the footage were used in the Second impeachment trial of Donald Trump.



2021 STORMING OF THE U.S. CAPITOL


During the storming of the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021, Sullivan entered the building with documentary filmmaker Jade Sacker and took extensive video, including video of the shooting of Ashli Babbitt.[2][1][22][23] Sullivan could be heard saying "Dude, this shit’s gonna go viral" after Babbit's death.[6]
Sacker, a Los Angeles-based independent documentary filmmaker,[24] was filming John Sullivan as part of a documentary on him and his brother, James.[25]

Sullivan later spoke to police and FBI agents about the shooting.[26] His involvement in the riots was cited by pro-Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani and The Gateway Pundit as part of a conspiracy theory alleging antifa's involvement in the riots.[27]

After the Capitol storming, Sullivan said he is not affiliated with BLM or Antifa, nor with the pro-Trump crowd, although he supports Black Lives Matter. When asked about the use of antifa hashtags in his social media posts, he rejected being associated with the group, but has stated that he, along with his group, is anti-fascist. He also has called himself a citizen journalist. Saying he was at the Capitol storming as a photojournalist, he filmed himself chanting "we about to burn this shit down" and "we accomplished this shit. We did this together. Fuck yeah! We are all a part of this history", "We gotta get this shit burned", and "It's our house, motherfuckers!" He also used a megaphone and shouted support. He said that he only said and did these things to "blend in" with the pro-Trump mob.[7][13][3][28] His brother, James Sullivan, said that he sent the FBI tips about John Sullivan about a week after the storming.[6]

On January 13, 2021, an arrest warrant with three counts related to the DC riot was signed by a magistrate judge. The affidavit was based on work by the Counterterrorism Section of the United States Department of Justice National Security Division and the United States Attorney for the District of Columbia. The affidavit stated that Sullivan entered the Capitol's west side by climbing through a broken window. He later approached another window and a knocking noise was heard, after which it was broken. Sullivan stated, "I broke it. My bad, my apologies. Well they already broke a window, so you know, I didn't know I hit it that hard. No one got that on camera." One charge, "40 U.S.C. § 5104(e)(2)(D)", is a specific crime of entering or remaining in the House of Congress without authorization. He also offered a knife to the protestors while they tried to break a window.[29][30][31][32][33] In the video, he also asks the police to not obstruct the protestors as he doesn't want any harm to come to them.[28] The arrest document also stated he had made a statement outside the Capitol about "burning this shit down" and "ripping Trump out of office" during a speech he made in August 2020 while pointing to the White House.[34][35]

Sullivan was arrested in Tooele County, Utah and appeared before a judge on January 15, 2021. Two computers, two cell phones, and camera equipment were siezed by the FBI. He was released with strict pre-trial conditions.[6][13][36][37] An FBI affidavit disputes the claim he was a photojournalist, as he had no press credentials.[2]

Federal authorities had not identified Sullivan as anti-fascist[5] and the FBI had announced on January 8 there was no evidence of Antifa involvement in the siege.[38] BLM Utah had for months disassociated itself from Sullivan on concerns that he might be associated with the Proud Boys.[39][40]