{"id":740360,"date":"2026-07-03T06:28:14","date_gmt":"2026-07-03T06:28:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/740360\/"},"modified":"2026-07-03T06:28:14","modified_gmt":"2026-07-03T06:28:14","slug":"air-force-officer-arrested-after-calling-for-trumps-impeachment-at-capitol","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/740360\/","title":{"rendered":"Air Force officer arrested after calling for Trump\u2019s impeachment at Capitol"},"content":{"rendered":"

An Air Force major was arrested in uniform on the steps of the Capitol after he called for the impeachment of President Donald Trump<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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U.S. Capitol Police arrested Jason Watson, an active-duty service member<\/a>, on Wednesday afternoon following remarks at a news conference<\/a> where he said Trump and Vice President JD Vance should be removed from office.<\/p>\n

The event was organized by the Removal Coalition, a group that lobbies members of Congress to impeach Trump, and attended by Rep. Al Green, D-Texas,<\/a> who has repeatedly introduced articles of impeachment against Trump.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m here with him because Rep. Green is the only member of Congress that has demonstrated the courage and conviction to … force a vote on articles of impeachment,\u201d Watson said at the event. \u201cIf Congress followed his example, we could remove the entire Trump administration, but Congress remains unconvinced of the urgency and necessity for them to honor their oaths, so we must persuade them with our unrelenting, uncompromising civil resistance.\u201d<\/p>\n

Watson said he is not a Democrat and does not share policy positions with Green, who lost his re-election bid<\/a> this year. Green\u2019s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Watson\u2019s arrest.<\/p>\n

Capitol Police said in a statement that it \u201cis generally against the law for the public to demonstrate on the House Steps unless they are with a Member of Congress.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYesterday afternoon, a man was escorted to the House Steps by a Member of Congress,\u201d the statement said. \u201cWhen the Member of Congress left the area, our officers gave the man lawful orders to stop the illegal demonstration or he would be arrested. The man refused our lawful orders.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"U.S.U.S. Air Force Major Jason Watson on the Capitol steps, in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday. Allison Bailey \/ AP<\/p>\n

Capitol Police identified the man as Watson, adding that he was arrested on charges of \u201cCrowding, Obstructing, and Incommoding\u201d and that it is legal to protest in other spots on the Capitol grounds.<\/p>\n

Service members are subject to stricter laws than the average citizen when it comes to protesting. The Uniform Code of Military Justice prohibits officers from \u201cusing contemptuous language towards the President, Vice president, the Secretaries of War and of a military department, Congress, and certain other officials,\u201d according to an Air Force memo last year.<\/p>\n

An Air Force spokesperson said in a statement Thursday: \u201cService members must comply with all laws, regulations and policies governing conduct and the wear of the uniform. All Department of the Air Force personnel are expected to uphold the highest standards of discipline and professionalism, both on and off duty.\u201d<\/p>\n

All service members, not just members of the Air Force, are prohibited from participating in \u201cpolitical activities\u201d in uniform.<\/p>\n

Watson\u2019s criticism of Trump and Vance focused on the administration\u2019s actions in Venezuela and Iran, calling them \u201can unconstitutional usurpation of Congress\u2019 authority and a violation of the War Powers Clause.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThese violations resulted in the deaths of 13 service members and injuries of hundreds more,\u201d he said, referring to the number of U.S. military deaths tied to the Iran war. \u201cFor this, the president and vice president must be impeached, convicted and removed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Watson also called the administration\u2019s immigration policies and tactics unconstitutional.<\/p>\n

The Removal Coalition did not immediately respond to a request for comment, and Watson could not be reached.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An Air Force major was arrested in uniform on the steps of the Capitol after he called for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":740361,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-740360","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/740360","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=740360"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/740360\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/740361"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=740360"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=740360"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=740360"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}