William Banks, Professor of Law Emeritus in the College of Law, was interviewed for the WAER story “What Can Come From DC Protests, for the White House, the GOP, the Nation? More Protest Reactions.” Banks, an expert on emergency power and national security law, says that those who breached the Capitol halls certainly broke laws and threatened the nation. “We certainly do have laws that forbid sedition; we have laws that forbid insurrection.  There’s a federal statute that forbade something called ‘seditious conspiracy’, 2 or more people coming together through the use of violence to obstruct government.  And that’s exactly what went on,” says Banks.