Man Who Abandoned His Ailing Mother to Attack Police on January 6th Says The Universe Made Him Do It

     It was a scene that horrified people around the world: Officer Daniel Hodges, his mask being ripped from his face, his body crushed in a doorway. The two men who directly assaulted Officer Hodges were convicted and sentenced to 85 and 90 months in prison. However, they alone were not responsible for Hodges' injuries. Over the course of several hours on January 6th, 2021, hundreds of people entered the Lower West Terrace tunnel and participated in the heave-ho push against law enforcement that would lead to Hodges' peril. In addition to these pushes, law enforcement would have to endure an improvised explosive device, a firecracker, a baseball bat, a hockey stick, a cattle prod, a taser, crutches, flagpoles, fire extinguishers, pepper spray and other chemical agents, batons, a strobe light, their own shields, brass knuckles, and countless other weapons. 

     At the front of all this violence were two men who gathered relatively little media attention: Bernard Sirr of Rhode Island and Luke Lints of Michigan. In virtually every photograph of the worst of the violence that day, these two are pushing against law enforcement at the very front of the crowd of insurrectionists and engaging in combat with these officers. Sirr was a Proud Boys affiliate who pleaded guilty to the felony charge of obstructing law enforcement during a civil disorder and was sentenced to two months in prison, six months of house arrest, one year of probation, and $2,000 restitution. 

     Then there's Lints. A farmhand and gardener from Traverse City, Luke Michael Lints marched to the Capitol with his mother on January 6th, posing for a selfie with her in front of the Lincoln Memorial. Strangely, he had not traveled to Washington, D.C. with her; they bumped into each other in the district by coincidence. His mother suffered from a medical emergency during the walk down Pennsylvania Avenue and was taken to a hospital via ambulance. Rather than go with his mother, Lints continued to the Capitol. When she was released from the hospital, she said her son seemed "scared" because of what he had done at the Capitol and refused to talk about it. As it turned out, this was for good reason.

     At the Lower West Terrace tunnel that day, Luke Lints attacked the police in a barbaric display of violence that highlights what made that day so dark. Lints arguably committed assault on an officer with a dangerous weapon, which makes the fact that his attorney got him off on the same felony Sirr pleaded guilty to a legal miracle for the Michigander.

     Over the course of 45 seconds of video, Lints is seen wielding a stolen riot shield, preventing officers from closing a door that would have ensured the safety of themselves and the building and ramming into officers' shields. This came after Lints passed two other stolen shields to the front of the mob. After exiting the tunnel, Lints saw other men attacking Officer Michael Fanone, and, to his credit, appeared disturbed by that level of violence against the lone officer and shouted in concern at his fellow rioters. His attitude that day and in the days that followed, one that seemed to be of genuine contrition, didn't last long.

     Lints has a YouTube channel with just under 40 subscribers. Between August 2021 and June 2022, just before his arrest on January 6th charges, he uploaded seven videos on gardening, and it was here that I was able to make contact with Mr. Lints. When I asked him if he had any comment on his felony indictment, he asked, "What exactly do you want me to say?" and added, "I'm currently discussing a plea deal but am leaning more towards a bench trial." A bench trial is a trial by judge, and Luke Lints and Bernard Sirr had their cases handled by Judge Trevor McFadden, a Trump appointee who is notoriously weak on January 6th defendants. That attitude doesn't exactly signal remorse.

     I pressed further, asking what brought him to the Capitol on January 6th. He replied cryptically, saying, "I believed being there was something I was meant to do, albeit encouraged by the universe or my highest self if you will." Well, for starters, it doesn't seem like Mr. Lints knows the definition of the word "albeit." Still, I pressed again, asking what he meant: God, Trump, something else? Mr. Lints stopped posting on YouTube after his arrest and stopped responding to comments on the platform. He pleaded guilty to obstruction of law enforcement during civil disorder.

     The Justice Department requested a sentence of ten months in prison. They cited what happened after he stopped posting to YouTube. On January 7th, 2023, two years after the insurrection, he appeared on a podcast and claimed that he only stole and wielded a riot shield to prevent the police from attacking the rioters, whom he called protestors. He falsely claimed that he only blocked police from closing that door so that the insurrectionists "trapped" on the other side could get out. On January 17th, 2023, he responded to a tweet by Officer Harry Dunn, calling the POLICE in the tunnel "out of control" and accusing an officer of killing Roseanne Boyland, who died of a drug overdose. Two days later, he reposted a BWC (body-worn camera) clip of an officer in the tunnel, calling the police "evil fucks" and "an embarrassment to our country." 

     In the end, Lints was sentenced to four months in prison, four months of house arrest, three years of probation, and $2,100 in restitution and special assessments. Lints was released from prison in February of this year and is set to get off of house arrest in the coming days. He'll be on probation until late 2026 or early 2027, which will at least keep the next two election cycles just a little bit safer.

     Luke Lints is a perfect case study of a January 6th insurrectionist and what makes the case that they are "political prisoners" so laughable. As the picture above, his misuse of relatively easy words in the English language, and his occupation suggests, Lints seems borderline simple-minded. I can't be too sure what to make of the fact that he abandoned his mom to attack police on January 6th. Considering she hadn't even gone to the Capitol with him on January 6th, there's a good chance she had about as high an opinion of his shit as I do. He was completely silent about the events of that day until it impacted him personally, and then it was an outrage. These things speak volumes about who Luke Lints is as a person and explain why Luke is the type of person who resorts to felonies when he loses an election: he is selfish, he has a victim complex, he is a loser, he is a grifter, and, to top it all off, he is an idiot. So, to the people of Michigan and to the people of Traverse City, watch out for this guy. His ankle monitor is about to come off.