Yavapai News

Following a visit to the Washington, D.C. jail where pre-trial detainees from January 6, 2021 are being held, Rep. Eli Crane (R-AZ) called for a "fair and speedy trial by a jury of peers" for the detainees.

"I was proud to join a bipartisan delegation to visit the J6 defendants," tweeted Crane. "As Americans, these detainees are entitled to a fair & speedy trial by a jury of peers instead of being kept as political prisoners. No American should be held behind bars while elites play political games."

Crane joined a bipartisan delegation of members of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee to visit the detainees, reported The Hill. Democrat Reps. Robert Garcia (CA) and Jasmine Crockett (TX) were also members of the visiting delegation.

The delegation was led by Rep. Marjorie Taylor-Greene (R-GA) who criticized Garcia and Crockett, saying the Democrat House members "sang the jail's praises."

"Shame on them for not knowing the long history of outrage in Washington DC about the DC Jail conditions and treatment," tweeted Taylor Greene. "OR they didn’t do their homework to know that the DC Jail had inmates/defendants clean, scrub, and paint the week before we got there so conditions would look good for our visit."

On March 7, 2023, Fox News host Tucker Carlson began airing previously unreleased video footage of the January 6th "Capitol breach" that was released to him from U.S. Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy. 

Crane told The Gateway Pundit blog that he is "hopeful" the airing of the video footage "leads to some of the folks that haven’t been treated fairly getting taken care of and hopefully getting out of jail."

In that March 13, 2023 interview, Crane said that a visit with the January 6th detainees "was one of the first things" he asked his staff to schedule when he took office. 

"I was told that unless I think it was the mayor and the warden signed off on it, I wouldn’t be able to do that," said Crane. "So, it’s definitely frustrating for many of us that don’t feel as if those folks have been treated very fairly."

Crane, 43, was first elected to represent Arizona’s Second Congressional District in Nov. 2023. He defeated incumbent U.S. Rep. Tom O’Halleren (D-Prescott), winning 54 percent to O’Halleran’s 46 percent.  

A Yuma native, Crane graduated from Cibola High School and attended Arizona Western and University of Arizona before dropping out a week after the September 11 attacks to enlist in the U.S. Navy. He served as a Navy SEAL from 2001-2014.

Arizona’s Second Congressional District includes all of northeast Arizona, including Flagstaff, Sedona, Prescott, Grand Canyon National Park, and the Navajo Indian Reservation as well as Maricopa, Casa Grande, Coolidge and Florence in south suburban Phoenix.