'Cowboys for Trump' founder Couy Griffin arrived to federal court in his signature black hat as his January 6 trial gets started just blocks from the US Capitol

• A January 6-related trial began Monday in the case of "Cowboys for Trump" founder Couy Griffin.
• Griffin arrived in a cowboy hat, and the trial featured video footage of him on the Capitol grounds.

Wearing his signature black cowboy hat, "Cowboys for Trump" founder Couy Griffin arrived Monday at a federal courthouse just blocks from the Capitol to stand trial on charges stemming from his alleged participation in the January 6, 2021, insurrection.

Griffin, a county commissioner in New Mexico, is the second accused participant in the Capitol attack to go to trial on January 6-related charges. His trial comes just weeks after a jury in Washington, DC, found Guy Reffitt guilty on five charges, including possession of a firearm on Capitol grounds.

Reffitt's trial presented a test for the Justice Department as it undertakes an investigation it has called "unprecedented," and the conviction marked a significant victory in the nearly 800 prosecutions related to the January 6 attack.

Unlike that trial, which featured felony charges, Griffin was accused only of misdemeanor offenses. Griffin elected to have a bench trial, meaning a Trump-appointed judge — rather than a jury of 12 — will review the evidence and decide his fate. Judge Trevor McFadden served as a top Justice Department official in the Trump administration before the Senate confirmed him in 2017 to the federal trial court in Washington, DC.

If convicted, Griffin faces up to a year in prison on each of the two charges against him: trespassing and disorderly conduct on restricted Capitol grounds.

'Like a huge, amazing Trump rally'

On Monday, federal prosecutors displayed video footage in McFadden's courtroom showing Griffin climbing a makeshift ramp as he approached the Capitol. The Justice Department said in charging papers that, following the January 6 insurrection, Griffin recorded a video in which he claimed to have "climbed up on the top of the Capitol building" and stated his intention to return on January 20 — the day then-President-elect Joe Biden's inauguration.

Prosecutors called Matthew Struck, who traveled with Griffin to Washington, DC, and recorded videos of him on January 6.

Struck received immunity for his testimony. On the witness stand, Struck said he used to post videos on his Twitter account "before it was shut down."

With Struck on the stand, prosecutors played one video in which Griffin recounted members of the pro-Trump mob spilling over barriers outside the Capitol.

"Pretty soon, it was like a huge, amazing Trump rally," Griffin said.

In the cross-examination of Struck, a defense lawyer for Griffin used his questioning to underscore that the "Cowboys for Trump" co-founder was not violent on January 6 and did not enter the Capitol building itself.

Struck responded "no" as the lawyer asked whether Griffin had destroyed anything, confronted law enforcement, or taken any action that would put someone in fear.

When asked whether he and Griffin had decided it would be "inappropriate" to enter the Capitol building, Struck replied, "I don't think we discussed that."

Pence's location at issue in case

Ahead of the trial, McFadden rejected Griffin's claim that he was politically targeted.

But the judge greenlighted a request from Griffin's defense lawyers to question a Secret Service agent about a lingering question around the events of January 6: the location of then-Vice President Mike Pence.

Griffin's defense lawyers plan to argue that, because Pence was rushed away amid the mayhem of January 6, the Capitol grounds were no longer a restricted, Secret Service-protected area by the time he was there.

Prosecutors have said that Pence remained at the Capitol complex during the relevant period. Regardless, they said the law only requires that Pence was at the complex or "would be" returning to prove that Griffin unlawfully entered a Secret Service-protected area.

In addition to those legal arguments, the Justice Department asserted that pinpointing Pence's precise location on January 6 would jeopardize the continuing security of future vice presidents, including Vice President Kamala Harris.

But McFadden rejected those arguments.

"To mount a meaningful defense Griffin must be allowed to test the veracity of the Government's contention that Vice President Pence was on the Capitol grounds during the relevant period," McFadden ruled.

Prosecutors plan to call a Secret Service inspector and Capitol police inspector later on Monday. The day-long trial is also expected to feature video footage of the January 14, 2021 meeting of the Otero County commissioners, where Griffin addressed his involvement in the Capitol attack.

"Several of the defendant's statements in the recording of the meeting constitute either direct admissions that he was illegally present in a restricted area or evidence of the defendant's state of mind during and after January 6, 2021," prosecutors said.

It is unclear when McFadden will hand down his verdict. At the outset of the bench trial, McFadden confirmed that Griffin wanted his verdict decided by a judge rather than a jury.

When McFadden posed a boilerplate question — about whether Griffin had taken drugs or alcohol — the accused Capitol rioter said he'd had a couple beers the night before.

"There's nothing illegal about that ... You feel clearheaded now?" the judge asked.

"Yessir," Griffin said.