Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-22-03042/USCOURTS-caDC-22-03042-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Couy Griffin
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued December 4, 2023 Decided October 22, 2024

No. 22-3042

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

APPELLEE

v.

COUY GRIFFIN,

APPELLANT

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 1:21-cr-00092-1)

Lisa B. Wright, Assistant Federal Public Defender, argued 

the cause for appellant. With her on the briefs was A. J. 

Kramer, Federal Public Defender. Tony Axam Jr., Assistant 

Federal Public Defender, entered an appearance.

Daniel J. Lenerz, Assistant U.S. Attorney, argued the 

cause for appellee. With him on the brief were Chrisellen R. 

Kolb and Nicholas P. Coleman, Assistant U.S. Attorneys. 

James Pearce, Attorney, U.S. Department of Justice, entered 

an appearance.

Before: PILLARD and KATSAS, Circuit Judges, and 

ROGERS, Senior Circuit Judge.

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Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge PILLARD.

Dissenting opinion filed by Circuit Judge KATSAS.

PILLARD, Circuit Judge: This appeal turns on 

interpretation of a federal law enacted to better protect the 

President and other national leaders from assassination, 

kidnapping, and assault. The law creates a narrow domain of 

federal trespass authority to prevent unauthorized members of 

the public from getting too close to a person under Secret 

Service protection. It does so by empowering the Secret 

Service to prevent unauthorized people from knowingly 

encroaching on “posted, cordoned off, or otherwise restricted” 

safety zones where the President or Vice President (current or 

past), a leading candidate for such office, or any of a handful 

of other Secret Service protectees “is or will be temporarily 

visiting.” 18 U.S.C. § 1752(c)(1)(B).

The defendant says a person “knowingly enters” the 

restricted safety zone only if he knows that the basis of the 

restriction is to safeguard a Secret Service protectee. Id. 

§ 1752(a)(1). We hold that knowingly breaching the restricted 

area suffices, even without knowing the basis of the 

restriction—here, the presence of Vice President Pence at the 

Capitol on January 6—which merely confirms that such 

trespasses are within Congress’s legislative authority.

Traditional tools of statutory interpretation establish that 

Congress intended to criminalize trespasses endangering 

Secret Service protectees regardless of the trespasser’s 

awareness of the basis for Congress’s authority to regulate 

them. And a contrary interpretation would impair the Secret 

Service’s ability to protect its charges. It would require Secret 

Service agents preventing members of the public from 

encroaching on a temporary security zone to confirm that each 

intruder knows that a person under Secret Service protection is 

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or is expected to be there. Neither the text nor the context of 

the statute supports that reading. 

Couy Griffin knowingly intruded into the area of the 

United States Capitol grounds that had been restricted in order 

to protect Vice President Pence on January 6, 2021, during the 

counting of the electoral college votes for President. Griffin

came to the Capitol that day along with thousands of other 

people to try to stop the certification of the electors’ ballots. 

He breached the boundary established to prevent public access 

and remained for approximately two hours in the restricted area 

while the Capitol Police struggled, facing serious injury and 

even death, to control the mob that overwhelmed them and 

broke into the Capitol Building. 

Following a bench trial, the district court convicted Griffin 

of violating 18 U.S.C. § 1752(a)(1), which prohibits 

“knowingly enter[ing] or remain[ing] in any restricted building 

or grounds without lawful authority to do so.” “Restricted 

building or grounds” refers to a limited number of “posted, 

cordoned off, or otherwise restricted area[s],” including the 

White House or Vice President’s residence, areas where a 

Secret Service protectee “is or will be temporarily visiting,” 

and areas being used for a “special event of national 

significance.” Id. § 1752(c)(1). The Capitol grounds fell under 

that provision on January 6 because a Secret Service protectee, 

Vice President Michael Pence, was expected to be and was 

present. Id. § 1752(c)(1)(B).

Griffin raises two arguments on appeal. He first asserts

that because waves of rioters ahead of him trampled much of 

the fencing and signage delineating the relevant area’s 

perimeter, it was no longer “posted, cordoned off, or otherwise 

restricted” when he entered and remained there. But Griffin’s 

main claim is that a conviction for “knowingly” entering or 

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remaining in a “restricted building or grounds” under section 

1752(a)(1) requires proof that the defendant not only knew that 

the area was restricted, but that he knew the reason for the 

restriction when he entered or remained. The government 

acknowledged its obligation to prove that Griffin knew the 

grounds were restricted; Griffin challenges the sufficiency of 

the proof on that point. The government disagreed that the 

statute also requires proof that Griffin knew precisely why the 

area was restricted, and the district court held that the 

government did not “have to prove [he] knew that a specific 

dignitary was there.” J.A. 534.

We hold that the grounds immediately surrounding the 

U.S. Capitol qualified as a “restricted building or grounds” 

under section 1752, and that they were adequately “posted, 

cordoned off, or otherwise restricted” when Griffin clambered 

over a stone wall and jumped inside. And we hold that a 

conviction for knowingly entering and remaining on such 

grounds in violation of section 1752(a)(1) required only that 

Griffin knew that he had entered or remained in a “posted, 

cordoned off, or otherwise restricted” area where he was not 

authorized to be. The government was not required to prove 

that Griffin was aware that the Vice President’s presence was 

the reason the grounds remained restricted. We therefore 

affirm the judgment of conviction. 

I.

A.

Section 1752 enables the Secret Service to protect the 

people and events they guard in settings the statute refers to as 

“restricted building[s] or grounds.” 18 U.S.C. § 1752(a). The 

statute has three subsections. Subsection (a) prohibits a range 

of conduct connected to those sites, including the trespass 

offense at issue in this appeal, as well as engaging in “any act 

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of physical violence” therein, and obstructing the means of 

ingress and egress to those sites with the intent to impede or 

disrupt government business. Id. §§ 1752(a)(1)-(5). 

Subsection (b) provides for criminal penalties, including 

imprisonment or a fine, or both, for those who violate 

subsection (a). Id. § 1752(b). The offense is punishable as a 

misdemeanor, id. § 1752(b)(2), unless a deadly or dangerous 

weapon is used or significant bodily injury results, in which 

case it may be punished as a felony, id. § 1752(b)(1).

Subsection (c) defines the term “restricted buildings or 

grounds” as “any posted, cordoned off, or otherwise restricted 

area”:

(A) of the White House or its grounds, or the Vice 

President’s official residence or its grounds;

(B) of a building or grounds where the President or 

other person protected by the Secret Service is 

or will be temporarily visiting; or

(C) of a building or grounds so restricted in 

conjunction with an event designated as a 

special event of national significance.

Id. §§ 1752(c)(1)(A)-(C). 

Section 1752 did not always have this three-part structure. 

It was enacted in 1971 as a more streamlined statute focused 

on protecting the President in the wake of a series of political 

assassinations in the 1960s—particularly those of President 

John F. Kennedy in Dallas and then-presidential candidate 

Robert F. Kennedy in Los Angeles. In recognition of the rising 

levels of violent political rhetoric and the “constant excoriation 

of America’s institutions and leaders” that made holding the 

office of the presidency increasingly dangerous, Congress set 

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out to provide stronger and more standardized security for the 

President. S. Rep. No. 91-1252, at 4 (1970). Congress 

recognized the complex challenges of protecting national 

leaders away from their usual offices or residences, where they 

are “most vulnerable”—whether from an “isolated and 

deranged individual” or from “organized premeditated 

attempts” on their lives. Id. at 6. 

At the time, no statute conferred federally enforceable 

authority on the Secret Service to restrict entry to places 

temporarily visited or used by the President. Instead, the 

Service relied on “the assistance of local authorities to arrest 

persons” under a patchwork of state and local criminal 

statutes—an arrangement that rendered it “increasingly 

difficult to maintain the necessary level of security” when local 

authorities were not present and closely coordinating or when 

the proper jurisdiction for arresting and prosecuting violations 

was unclear. Id. at 7. To remedy that impediment to 

presidential security, Congress enacted section 1752, creating

a federal offense encompassing trespasses that the Secret 

Service had previously relied on state and local officials to 

enforce under state and local trespass laws. Id. at 7. In this 

way, Congress provided “a uniform minimum of Federal 

jurisdiction for Presidential security when the President is on 

temporary visits,” id. at 6, by empowering the Secret Service 

to prevent “physical presence [and] physical violence within 

the security perimeter” created by temporarily restricted areas 

surrounding the President, id. at 9. 

Over the decades, Congress has repeatedly revisited 

section 1752, expanding its coverage to align with the broader 

scope of the Secret Service’s protective duties. At first, the 

statute protected only places designated as the President’s 

temporary residence or office or any other building or grounds 

where the President was or would be temporarily visiting. See

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18 U.S.C. § 1752(a)(1) (1971). In 1982, Congress amended the 

statute to extend “the same ‘zone of protection’ authority”

applicable to the President to all Secret Service protectees

(which includes the Vice President). See Pub. L. No. 97-308, 

96 Stat. 1451, 1451-52 (1982). In 2006, Congress again 

amended the statute to apply beyond sites temporarily visited 

by protectees to also shield any “event designated as a special 

event of national significance.” See Pub. L. No. 109-177, 120 

Stat. 192, 252 (2006). Finally, in 2012, Congress added federal 

protection against intrusion into the White House or Vice 

President’s residence or their grounds. See Pub. L. No. 112-

98, 126 Stat. 263, 263-64 (2012). In so doing, Congress 

acknowledged that the Secret Service had previously relied on 

District of Columbia trespass law to protect those sites. H.R. 

Rep. 112-9, at 2 (2011).

1

B.

In January 2021, Griffin was serving as an elected

Commissioner on the Otero County Commission in southern 

New Mexico and as the leader of a political committee called 

“Cowboys for Trump.” He decided to travel to Washington, 

D.C. to attend the Stop the Steal rally on the National Mall on 

January 6, 2021—the day that Congress was set to certify the 

Electoral College vote that confirmed the outcome of the 2020 

presidential election. He arrived by January 5 and recorded a 

video of himself in front of the U.S. Capitol’s western side,

declaring that he was “praying for” former Vice President 

Pence and “trust[ed] that he would do the right 

1 In referencing the importance of section 1752 to the Secret 

Service’s ability to shield the President, Vice President, and other 

protectees, we recognize that the Secret Service works together with 

other protective forces—as it did in this case—and take no position 

on whether section 1752 requires the Secret Service itself to 

designate or secure the “restricted buildings or grounds.”

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thing . . . tomorrow.” GX 63 at 1:00-1:13. Fencing 

surrounding the grassy areas in front of the Capitol was visible 

behind Griffin in the video. Id. 

In anticipation of the rally and certification, the Secret 

Service worked in coordination with the U.S. Capitol Police to 

prepare for Vice President Pence’s visit to the Capitol. The 

Secret Service informed the Capitol Police of Vice President 

Pence’s anticipated schedule of arrivals and departures to and 

from each location he intended to visit at the Capitol, and the 

Capitol Police prepared for the certification, including Vice 

President Pence’s presence at the Capitol. Pursuant to its 

longstanding relationship with the Secret Service, the Capitol 

Police implemented “an agreed-upon standard boundary” to 

secure a perimeter on the grounds immediately surrounding the 

Capitol. J.A. 450. To do so, the Capitol Police erected barriers 

using temporary crowd-control fencing that they referred to as 

metal “bike racks” and plastic “snow fencing” to supplement 

permanent walls. They also placed temporary fencing both 

immediately behind the permanent walls and midway up the 

west lawn to protect the inaugural stage that was being 

prepared for Inauguration Day. The racks and fencing were 

posted with signs reading “Area Closed by Order of the United 

States Capitol Police Board” and were patrolled by law 

enforcement officers.

On January 6, Griffin attended the Stop the Steal rally on 

the Ellipse adjacent to the White House and followed the crowd 

as it proceeded toward the U.S. Capitol. Griffin was not at the 

front of the crowd. Shortly after 2 p.m., as the first wave of 

rioters to have breached the security perimeter shattered the 

Capitol Building’s windows and climbed inside, Griffin was 

taking photos and exchanging social media information with 

other rally attendees near the Capitol Reflecting Pool adjacent 

to the west lawn of the Capitol. At 2:31 p.m.—around the same 

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time that Capitol Police officers were conducting emergency 

evacuations of the House and Senate chambers in response to 

the breach of the Capitol Building—Griffin used the seat of a 

parked bicycle to boost himself over a five-foot-tall stone wall 

separating a sidewalk from the Capitol’s west front lawn. He 

landed on a trampled length of plastic snow fencing that the 

U.S. Capitol Police had erected to cordon off the area.

Once inside the grounds, Griffin proceeded up the lawn to 

the base of the inaugural stage, scaling two other walls along 

the way with the help of a metal bike rack and a plywood ramp

manned by other rioters helping the crowd advance toward the 

Capitol. After he ascended the bike rack, he narrated to a 

camera “we’re in now” and joked to a masked rioter that he,

too, needed a face mask to obscure his identity. GX 37-1 at 

1:10-28. As Griffin made his way toward the front of the 

crowd, the crowd packed increasingly closely together in 

pressing toward the Capitol, with rioters scaling the bannisters 

of the Capitol steps, banging on the Capitol terraces with 

flagpoles, pounding on the doors of the inaugural stage, and 

urging the crowd forward with shouts of “this is our House” 

and “break the doors down.”

Griffin proceeded to the foot of the inaugural platform, 

near an emergency stairwell door, where he announced that he 

would “wait until they get this door broken down” to go up on 

the inaugural stage. GX 40-1 at 0:25-30. Griffin managed to 

make his way onto the inaugural stage. As he climbed the 

stairs, he proclaimed—in response to the smell of pepper spray 

officers used to try to clear the area—that he “love[s] the smell 

of napalm in the air.” GX 43-1 at 0:30-40; see also J.A. 536. 

Having ascended the stage, he borrowed a bullhorn in an 

attempt to lead the rioters below in prayer. Around that time, 

a crowd of rioters armed with plastic riot shields and flagpoles 

massed in a tunnel approximately a hundred feet away from 

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Griffin, pressing against and engaging in hand-to-hand combat 

with Metropolitan Police Department officers in an attempt to 

gain access to the Capitol. Griffin stayed up on the inaugural 

stage and the nearby terrace until at least 4:48 p.m.

As explained at trial by a member of the Secret Service 

detail accompanying Vice President Pence, his wife, and their 

daughter, the “unknown individuals who were breaking 

through a security barrier of a site where [the Secret Service]

had protectees” posed a security risk by “potentially taking 

away options for our routes out” of the Capitol. J.A. 422. Due 

to breaches of security, “the Capitol went into lockdown, which 

means everything has to stop, and the doors lock, and people 

aren’t allowed in,” and “any official actions that are taking 

place” are halted. J.A. 426. The mass security breaches on 

January 6 by thousands of people, including Griffin, halted the 

certification of the electoral votes while the Secret Service 

sought to safeguard the Vice President and his family in a 

building under attack. The Vice President, his wife, and their 

daughter remained at an underground loading dock at the 

Capitol under Secret Service protection for four or five hours, 

not returning to the Senate Chamber until approximately 7 p.m. 

J.A. 425-27.

The next day, Griffin resurfaced in Roanoke, Virginia, 

where he recorded another video. He asserted that he heard

when he was “about three-quarters of the way down [to the 

Capitol]” on January 6 that “Mike Pence had sold us all out.”

GX 64 at 3:20-35. Griffin went on to explain that the inaugural 

stage was “set up for Joe Biden” and “roped off” on the Capitol 

grounds. Id. at 3:35-4:15. As he put it, “You’re gonna have 

those patriots who get in there and went over the—when the 

D.C. police tells ‘em you can’t step over this because this is—

we’re getting it ready for Joe Biden. What do you think was 

gonna happen?” Id. 

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The following week, Griffin addressed his colleagues on 

the Otero County Commission. He told them:

On the inaugural side, all those Trump people got 

down there, had not got anything necessarily from the 

President that was new, and then heard that Mike 

Pence had certified a fraudulent election. The element 

in the crowd was pretty elevated, I would say. But 

when they got down to the inaugural side, there was 

some fencing up, and they were saying that you 

couldn’t go any further because this was being 

reserved for Joe Biden and his inauguration. You tell 

a million Trump supporters that, they’re going down 

there. Pretty soon that crowd just pushed through. I 

wasn’t anywhere in the front of it. I was in the back. 

GX 78 at 2:27-3:12. Griffin said that he planned to return to 

Washington, D.C. for Inauguration Day with multiple firearms. 

See id. at 11:10-11:50. Days later, he was arrested in 

Washington, D.C.

C.

Federal prosecutors charged Griffin with two 

misdemeanors: entering and remaining in a restricted building 

or grounds, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1752(a)(1), and 

disorderly and disruptive conduct in a restricted building or 

grounds, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1752(a)(2). He opted for 

a bench trial before the district court. 

Shortly before trial, the parties briefed whether the 

government would be required to prove that Griffin knew Vice 

President Pence was visiting the Capitol at the time Griffin was 

on the Capitol grounds. Griffin argued that, because section 

1752(a)(1)’s “knowingly” modifies the object of the prohibited 

conduct—the “restricted building or grounds” in which a 

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defendant enters or remains—a defendant must be shown to 

know the characteristics of the area that qualify it as a 

“restricted building or grounds” pursuant to section 1752(c)(1), 

which include the presence of a Secret Service protectee. See 

Griffin’s Resp. to Gov’t’s Trial Br. at 3 (J.A. 129). 

At the conclusion of the bench trial, the district court 

rejected Griffin’s argument, concluding that section 1752’s 

condition that a defendant act “knowingly” did not require 

knowledge of the presence of a Secret Service protectee. The 

court noted that “it doesn’t make a lot of sense” to require proof 

that the defendant “knew that a specific dignitary was there,” 

and found it unimaginable that “a provision that is looking to 

protect Secret Service protectees would require the Secret 

Service to somehow be telling people and proving that 

[defendants] knew which protectee was in the restricted area at 

what time.” J.A. 534. It sufficed, the district court held, that 

the area was restricted because of Vice President Pence’s 

presence when Griffin entered and stayed, J.A. 530-532, and 

that, “by the time [Griffin] was on the stage, he certainly knew 

he shouldn’t be there. And yet, he remained.” J.A. 537. The 

court accordingly convicted Griffin of violating 18 U.S.C. 

§ 1752(a)(1).

As to the section 1752(a)(2) charge of disruptive or 

disorderly conduct in or near a restricted building or grounds, 

the court found “more than a reasonable doubt as to whether he 

intended for his conduct to disrupt the certification of the 

election.” J.A. 539. Despite “some close questions about 

whether his mere presence impeded or disrupted government 

business,” the court held the government failed to prove that 

Griffin “engaged in disorderly or disruptive conduct.” J.A. 

539. And it failed to establish that Griffin “acted knowingly 

and with intent” to impede or disrupt congressional business,

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because Griffin “thought the electoral certification had already 

occurred prior to his entering the restricted area.” J.A. 537-38. 

The district court sentenced Griffin to fourteen days of 

incarceration, with credit for time served, and one year of 

supervised release. He timely filed this appeal.

II.

To violate section 1752(a)(1), a defendant must 

“knowingly” and “without lawful authority” enter or remain in 

a “restricted building or grounds.” Griffin contends the district 

court should have acquitted him for two reasons. First, he 

argues that the government failed to prove beyond a reasonable 

doubt that the area immediately surrounding the U.S. Capitol 

was sufficiently demarcated as restricted when he entered and 

remained there. Second, Griffin argues that the government

failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Griffin knew not 

just that the area was restricted, but also the reason for that 

restriction—here, that Vice President Pence, a Secret Service 

protectee, was or would be visiting.

Griffin challenges both the district court’s interpretation of 

section 1752’s elements and the sufficiency of the evidence to 

support his conviction. We review de novo the district court’s 

interpretation of the statute. See United States v. Verrusio, 762 

F.3d 1, 13 (D.C. Cir. 2014); see also United States v. Johnson, 

979 F.3d 632, 636 (9th Cir. 2020) (“In a bench trial, a district 

court’s legal error regarding the elements of the offense is 

reviewed in the same way we review an erroneous jury 

instruction regarding the elements of the offense.”). In 

reviewing the sufficiency of the evidence, we defer to the 

factfinder’s verdict, considering the evidence “in the light most 

favorable to the government.” United States v. Robertson, 103 

F.4th 1, 10-11 (D.C. Cir. 2023) (quoting United States v. Shi, 

991 F.3d 198, 205 (D.C. Cir. 2021)); see also United States v. 

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Brock, 94 F.4th 39, 46 (D.C. Cir. 2024) (explaining that “this 

standard is the same for both jury and non-jury cases”). We 

consider the evidence taken as a whole, and with reasonable 

inferences drawn in the light most favorable to the verdict. 

United States v. Broda, 848 F.3d 1044, 1053 (D.C. Cir. 2017). 

We will affirm a guilty verdict if “any rational trier of fact 

could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a 

reasonable doubt.” Musacchio v. United States, 577 U.S. 237, 

243 (2016) (quoting Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319 

(1979)). 

A.

We begin with Griffin’s argument that the government 

failed to prove the requisite conduct, or actus reus, under 

section 1752(a)(1). The U.S. Capitol grounds are ordinarily 

open to the public. J.A. 337. To qualify as a “restricted 

building or grounds” protected by section 1752, those grounds 

must have been “posted, cordoned off, or otherwise restricted” 

at the time Griffin entered or remained there. 18 U.S.C. 

§ 1752(c)(1). 

Apart from his argument addressed below regarding his 

knowledge of the grounds restriction, Griffin argues that, by 

the time he entered, the grounds were in fact no longer 

restricted within the meaning of the statute. They were neither 

posted nor cordoned off, he claims, because earlier waves of 

the rioters had torn down the temporary fencing and trampled 

signs announcing the closure. Griffin Br. 21-22, 46-47; see

J.A. 345. And, reading “otherwise restricted” narrowly to 

require demarcation “comparable to a physical ‘posting’ or 

‘cordoning off,’” Griffin Br. 40, Griffin insists only a clear, 

observable demarcation would suffice. He argues his 

conviction cannot stand because the barriers and signs had been 

trampled or pushed aside. Id.

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The statutory text imposes no such requirement. 

“Otherwise” means “in another way” or “in a different 

manner,” and “restricted” means deemed “accessible only to 

certain authorized people.” Otherwise (adv.), Oxford English 

Dictionary (2d ed. 1989); Restricted (adj.), Oxford English 

Dictionary. Section 1752 thus applies to areas made nonpublic 

by posting signs, cordoning off the area, or in some other way 

effecting the restriction, regardless of whether the method 

consistently and physically stakes out the area’s boundaries. 

For example, to “otherwise restrict[]” an area, officers or 

agents charged with excluding the public could position 

themselves around the area occupied by a protected person or 

move in coordination with the protectee, as they typically do 

when the President or Vice President is on foot moving through 

otherwise publicly accessible areas. Or they might use a sound 

system or official briefing warning people to maintain a 

specified distance as means to control the perimeter, 18 U.S.C. 

§ 1752(c)(1), even without static visual demarcation of an

area’s boundaries. J.A. 444.

The drafting history confirms as much. When Congress 

first promulgated section 1752, it “anticipated that the Secret 

Service [would] make every effort . . . to make such restricted 

areas known to the public,” S. Rep. 91-1252, at 9, but it 

declined to list exhaustively the ways in which the public 

would be excluded. By separately requiring proof of a 

defendant’s subjective awareness that the area was “posted, 

cordoned off, or otherwise restricted,” Congress ensured that 

unwitting trespassers would not be punished. Id. That

approach accommodated the reality that “flexibility must be 

maintained” to ensure adequate security. Id. at 2. 

Griffin’s proposed physical demarcation requirement 

would undermine the function of section 1752(a)(1). Under his 

reading, a defendant would be entitled to acquittal so long as 

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he waited until a sufficiently strong gust of wind, a soaking 

downpour—or even a less scrupulous prior intruder—disposed

of law enforcement tape, fencing, or signage before he entered

a sensitive area in full awareness he was not lawfully 

authorized to do so. We decline to read the statute to allow a 

mob to de-restrict an officially restricted area encompassing 

persons under Secret Service protection.

With the meaning of those terms thus settled, we hold that 

the evidence at trial was sufficient for a reasonable factfinder

to conclude that the U.S. Capitol grounds qualified on January 

6 as a “restricted building or grounds” and were “posted, 

cordoned off, or otherwise restricted” when Griffin entered and 

remained there. In anticipation of then-Vice President Pence’s 

presence at the Capitol to certify the electoral votes on January 

6, law enforcement officers had erected barriers around the 

perimeter of the closed area with layers of snow fencing and 

bike racks supplementing pre-existing permanent walls to 

encircle the Capitol grounds. Signs indicating the area was 

closed were affixed along the barriers. By the time Griffin 

entered the restricted area, many of those physical 

manifestations of its closure had been largely trampled, but that 

fact did not alter the status of the area as closed to the public. 

The Secret Service’s protectees, then-Vice President Pence and 

his wife and daughter, remained within the Capitol complex, 

sheltering in the eye of the riot’s storm. Far from reopening 

the grounds, law enforcement officers remained onsite battling 

to secure them.

B.

We turn next to Griffin’s arguments that he lacked the 

requisite knowledge to be convicted. Griffin argues that the 

government failed to prove the knowledge element in two 

ways. First, he contends that there is insufficient evidence to 

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support the district court’s finding that Griffin knowingly 

entered or remained within a “posted, cordoned off, or 

otherwise restricted” area. Second, Griffin argues that the

district court misread the statute in not requiring the 

government to prove that he knew why the Capitol grounds 

were restricted—namely, that former Vice President Pence was 

or would be visiting the Capitol—and that the trial evidence 

failed to establish his knowledge of the Vice President’s 

whereabouts. 

We can quickly dispose of Griffin’s first argument. 

Griffin insists that a reasonable factfinder could only have 

found that, when Griffin entered the Capitol grounds, he 

believed that the area was no longer restricted. See Griffin Br. 

60 (describing Griffin’s view of the trampled fencing as “akin 

to seeing rolled up fencing after a 4th of July concert”). 

The evidence does not support that claim. Viewed in the 

light most favorable to the government, the trial evidence 

showed that Griffin knew he had entered or remained without 

authorization in a “posted, cordoned off, or otherwise 

restricted” area. The district court found “ample evidence that 

Mr. Griffin knowingly entered or remained within the 

restricted area.” J.A. 536. The government proved that Griffin 

saw the rings of fencing and signage encircling the Capitol 

grounds on January 5, when he recorded a video with the 

grounds as his backdrop. J.A. 536 (district court’s oral ruling);

see also GX 63. And it showed that, the next day, when Griffin 

scaled the stone wall that partially delineated the grounds, he

landed on trampled snow fencing and signs, GX 33-1, which 

the district court observed would suggest to a reasonable 

person “that perhaps you should not be entering the area.” J.A. 

536. The evidence that Griffin knew he was trespassing only 

mounted as he continued to progress across the grounds. 

Arriving at the base of the inaugural stage, he announced, 

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18

“we’re in now,” and joked that he should hide his identity with 

a face mask. GX 37-1 at 1:10-28. When Griffin quipped that 

he loved the “smell of napalm in the air,” he showed he knew 

that law enforcement officers were using teargas as they battled

to expel the mob—a clear sign that the area remained restricted. 

GX 43-1 at 0:30-40; see also J.A. 536.

Griffin’s public statements in the days after January 6 

confirm that Griffin knew when he entered and stayed on the 

Capitol grounds that the area was “restricted” within the 

meaning of section 1752(c)(1). See J.A. 536-37. On January 

7, Griffin recalled that the inaugural stage that he climbed was 

“roped off,” and that “D.C. police” had told the rioters “you 

can’t step over this.” GX 64 at 3:20-4:15. And, on January 14, 

Griffin reiterated that “there was some fencing up” that alerted 

the rioters they “couldn’t go any further,” but the crowd—

including Griffin—“just pushed through.” GX 78 at 2:27-3:12. 

Accordingly, a rational factfinder could conclude—as, 

indeed, the district court did, see J.A. 536-37—that Griffin was 

aware that the U.S. Capitol grounds were “posted, cordoned 

off, or otherwise restricted” and his presence was unauthorized 

when he remained there during the afternoon of January 6, 

2021.

C.

To prevail, then, Griffin must persuade us that the district 

court misinterpreted section 1752(a)(1)’s knowledge 

requirement. Section 1752(a)(1) prohibits “knowingly

enter[ing] or remain[ing] in any restricted building or grounds 

without lawful authority to do so.” 18 U.S.C. § 1752(a)(1). 

And, as relevant here, section 1752(c)(1) defines the term 

“restricted buildings or grounds” to mean “any posted, 

cordoned off, or otherwise restricted area . . . of a building or 

grounds where the President or other person protected by the 

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19

Secret Service is or will be temporarily visiting.” Id.

§ 1752(c)(1)(B). 

As we explained, the district court reasonably found that 

the Capitol grounds were “posted, cordoned off, or otherwise 

restricted” when he entered, and that Griffin knew that they 

were. But Griffin argues that the statute demands something 

more: In his view, the statute also requires proof that he knew 

why the Capitol grounds were so restricted when he entered or 

remained there—i.e., that Griffin knew that a Secret Service 

protectee was or would be temporarily visiting the Capitol 

grounds. We decline to adopt such a rule, which would 

contravene the statute’s text as read in accord with binding 

precedent of the Supreme Court and this court, and would 

undermine the statute’s context and purpose. Every indicator 

points in the same direction: A person trespassing on grounds 

he knows are restricted, where he knows he lacks permission 

to be, may be convicted of a federal misdemeanor trespass 

under section 1752(a)(1) even if he does not know that a Secret 

Service protectee is within.

1.

“Whether a criminal statute requires the Government to 

prove that the defendant acted knowingly is a question of 

congressional intent.” Rehaif v. United States, 588 U.S. 225, 

228 (2019) (citing Staples v. United States, 511 U.S. 600, 605 

(1994)). Griffin contends that Congress’s intent is clear—and 

“dictated by text.” Griffin 28(j) Ltr. at 2 (Feb. 19, 2024). He

argues that section 1752(a) uses “restricted building or 

grounds” as a defined term, so its appearances across the text 

of subsection (a)(1) must be treated as shorthand for every 

detail of the term’s definition. In Griffin’s view, because 

“knowingly” modifies “restricted building or grounds,” the 

government must prove that he had knowledge not just that 

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20

access was restricted, but the precise reason why it was 

restricted. Griffin Br. 48-57. Otherwise, Griffin urges, the 

government would have failed to prove that the defendant 

knew he entered a “restricted building or grounds” as the 

statute requires. 

In support of this argument, Griffin cites McFadden v. 

United States, 576 U.S. 186 (2015), in which the Supreme 

Court held that violation of the Controlled Substances Act’s 

prohibition of “knowingly . . . distribut[ing] . . . a controlled 

substance” required the defendant to know that he distributed 

something that qualified as a “controlled substance” as 

elsewhere defined by the Act. 576 U.S. at 191-92. “[J]ust as 

it is not enough to know that a substance is generically 

‘controlled’ (antibiotics are ‘controlled’),” Griffin urges, “it is 

not enough to know that a building or grounds is generically 

‘restricted’ (any place bearing an ‘area closed’ sign is 

‘restricted’).” Griffin Br. 54.

Griffin’s reading of the extent of the statute’s knowledge 

requirement fails because it is contrary to both Supreme Court 

precedent and contextual evidence of Congress’s purpose. 

Grammatical rules and presumptions regarding statutory 

knowledge requirements and “jurisdictional only” elements all

weigh against extending the “knowingly” requirement in 

section 1752(a)(1) to the specific reason that the area is 

“posted, cordoned off, or otherwise restricted.” 

Griffin is correct that a handful of Supreme Court cases, 

including McFadden, hold that, at least for relatively short 

statutory phrases, “[a]s a matter of ordinary English grammar, 

it seems natural to read the statute’s word ‘knowingly’ as 

applying to all the subsequently listed elements of the crime.” 

Flores-Figueroa v. United States, 556 U.S. 646, 650 (2009). 

The Court in Flores-Figueroa, for example, interpreted the 

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21

phrase “knowingly transfers, possesses, or uses, without lawful 

authority, a means of identification of another person,” 18 

U.S.C. § 1028A(a)(1), to require that the defendant knew the 

identification he used belonged to “another person.” Id.

That precedent does not resolve this case. To begin with, 

the Court has adopted that understanding of ordinary usage 

inconsistently even as applied to relatively short and 

straightforward statutory phrases. For instance, in Liparota v. 

United States, 471 U.S. 419 (1985), the Court analyzed 

whether, in a statutory phrase concerning someone who 

“knowingly uses, transfers, acquires, alters, or possesses 

coupons or authorization cards in any manner not authorized 

by [the statute],” the “knowingly” requirement extends to the 

fact that the use was unauthorized. Id. at 420-21. The Court 

concluded that “the words themselves provide little guidance,” 

as “[e]ither interpretation would accord with ordinary usage.”

Id. at 424. Instead, to determine that “knowingly” extended to 

the unauthorized nature of the use, the Court relied on the

judicial presumptions that elements criminalizing otherwise 

innocent conduct are subject to a mens rea requirement and that 

ambiguous statutes should be interpreted leniently. Id. at 424-

27.

More to the point, “where the modifier ‘knowingly’

introduces a long statutory phrase,” the ordinary meaning

Griffin asserts loses its clarity, “such that questions may 

reasonably arise about how far into the statute the modifier 

extends.” Rehaif, 588 U.S. at 230. And when a statutory 

phrase is long enough, the ordinary usage presumption flips, so 

that the “most natural grammatical reading . . . suggests that the 

term ‘knowingly’ modifies only the surrounding verbs” and 

does not travel down to modify elements “set forth in 

independent clauses separated by interruptive 

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punctuation.” United States v. X-Citement Video, Inc., 513

U.S. 64, 68 (1994). 

The Court in X-Citement Video accordingly had to reach 

beyond rules of grammar to interpret a statute penalizing “[a]ny

person who—(1) knowingly transports or ships [using any 

means or facility of] interstate or foreign commerce by any 

means including by computer or mails, any visual depiction, 

if—(A) the producing of such visual depiction involves the use 

of a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct.” Id. It 

recognized that, in the most natural reading of that long text 

string, “the word ‘knowingly’ would not modify the elements 

of the minority of the performers, or the sexually explicit nature 

of the material.” Id. The Court ultimately rejected that “most 

natural grammatical reading” because of “anomalies which 

[would] result,” and to ensure that “some form of scienter” 

would apply to avoid criminalizing conduct that was not only 

“otherwise innocent” but protected by the First Amendment. 

Id. at 68-69, 72-73. 

Here, the statutory phrase—“knowingly enters or remains 

in any . . . posted, cordoned off, or otherwise restricted area . . . 

of a building or grounds where the President or other person 

protected by the Secret Service is or will be temporarily 

visiting,” where “other person protected by the Secret Service” 

is further defined as “any person whom the United States Secret 

Service is authorized to protect under section 3056 of this title 

or by Presidential memorandum, when such person has not 

declined such protection,” 18 U.S.C. §§ 1752(a), (c)—is 

sufficiently long to raise “questions . . . about how far into the 

statute the modifier extends.” Rehaif, 588 U.S. at 230. The 

statutory definition of “restricted building or grounds” requires 

not just following section 1752(a)’s reference to subsection 

(c)(1), and then to either (A), (B), or (C), but also, if (B) applies,

flipping to section 3056 to find the list of protectees under the 

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Secret Service’s care. Some protectees defined by the section 

are straightforward—e.g., the “President [and] the Vice 

President.” 18 U.S.C. § 3056(a)(1). But others are contingent 

on further facts, such as the Secret Service’s protection of 

children of former Presidents only until their sixteenth 

birthday, or its protection of “distinguished foreign 

visitors . . . when the President directs that such protection be 

provided.” Id. § 3056(a)(6). 

The “most natural grammatical reading” of that 

matryoshka doll of nested statutory references is that “the word 

‘knowingly’ would not modify” all elements in each reference. 

X-Citement Video, 513 U.S. at 68. No grammatical rule 

requires that “knowingly” be read to apply, for example, to 

elements that are not only “set forth in independent clauses 

separated by interruptive punctuation,” but span multiple, 

separate statutory provisions. Id. (holding that the “most 

natural grammatical reading” would not extend “knowingly” to 

subsections listing further specifications of the offense, and 

describing em-dashes introducing those requirements as 

“interruptive punctuation”). And here, unlike in X-Citement 

Video, the grammatically natural reading neither produces 

“anomalies” nor fails to require a culpable state of mind—and 

certainly not in a way that raises a risk of punishing 

constitutionally protected conduct. Id. To the contrary, it is 

Griffin’s construction that would produce absurd results. It 

would require a defendant to know that the protectee “has not 

declined” Secret Service protection. See 18 U.S.C. 

§ 1752(c)(2). If the protectee is a visiting official from abroad, 

it would require a defendant charged under section 1752(a) to 

know that the President saw fit to grant that visitor Secret 

Service protection pursuant to section 3056(a)(7). And if the 

basis for a restriction is a “special event of national 

significance,” see 18 U.S.C. § 1752(c)(1)(C), a defendant 

would have to know that it has been so designated. If we read 

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24 

the knowledge requirement to jump the em-dash into 

subsection (c)(1)(B) as Griffin urges, we would by all 

indications have to do the same for those qualifiers. See, e.g., 

Clark v. Martinez, 543 U.S. 371, 378 (2005) (“The operative 

language . . . applies without differentiation to all three 

categories . . . that are its subject. To give these same words a 

different meaning for each category would be to invent a statute 

rather than interpret one.”). This is no far-fetched reductio ad 

absurdum, post at 10-12; it is a direct consequence of Griffin’s 

own syntactic logic and suggests that Griffin’s interpretation—

which is not required by any interpretive rule and defies 

common sense—cannot be correct. 

Although the plain text makes clear that “knowingly” does 

not apply all the way down the definitional line, the text alone 

“provide[s] little guidance” regarding how far “knowingly” 

extends. Liparota, 471 U.S. at 424. To answer that question, 

we turn to longstanding judicial presumptions, Supreme Court 

precedent, and the statute’s context and purpose. Because 

those interpretive tools reveal the answer—“knowingly” does 

not extend to the reason for the restriction listed in subsection 

(c)(1)(B)—we have no occasion to apply the rule of lenity, 

which “applies only when, after consulting traditional canons 

of statutory construction, we are left with an ambiguous 

statute.” Shular v. United States, 589 U.S. 154, 165 (2020)

(quoting United States v. Shabani, 513 U.S. 10, 17 (1994)); see 

also Ocasio v. United States, 578 U.S. 282, 295 (2016)

(explaining that the rule of lenity “applies only when a criminal 

statute contains a ‘grievous ambiguity or uncertainty,’ and 

‘only if, after seizing everything from which aid can be 

derived,’ the Court ‘can make no more than a guess as to what 

Congress intended.’”) (quoting Muscarello v. United States, 

524 U.S. 125, 138-39 (1998)).

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2.

As noted above, “[w]hether a criminal statute requires the 

Government to prove that the defendant acted knowingly is a 

question of congressional intent.” Rehaif, 588 U.S. at 228 

(citing Staples, 511 U.S. at 605). “In determining Congress’ 

intent, we start from a longstanding presumption . . . that 

Congress intends to require a defendant to possess a culpable 

mental state regarding ‘each of the statutory elements that 

criminalize otherwise innocent conduct.’” Id. (quoting XCitement Video, 513 U.S. at 72). But that presumption is both 

limited and rebuttable. 

Two interpretive rules confirm that section 1752(a)(1) 

requires only that a defendant “knowingly enter[] or remain[] 

in” an area that is “posted, cordoned off, or otherwise

restricted.” For one thing, the presumption “flips” for the 

jurisdictional elements of a federal offense, so courts presume 

that a criminal statute’s knowledge requirement is typically 

inapplicable to such jurisdictional elements. Torres v. Lynch, 

578 U.S. 452, 468 (2016). And, more generally, contextual 

clues may rebut the presumption in favor of scienter. Applying 

those rules here confirms that section 1752(a)(1) does not 

require that the defendant further know which of the subsection 

(c)(1) requirements is the reason for the restriction. 

a.

Federal criminal prohibitions, unlike their state 

counterparts, contain jurisdictional elements that “connect[] 

the law to one of Congress’s enumerated powers, thus 

establishing legislative authority.” Torres, 578 U.S. at 467-68. 

Those jurisdictional elements must be proven beyond a 

reasonable doubt, as with any element of a criminal offense. 

See id. But they are also distinctive as subjects of statutory 

interpretation: When Congress has not explicitly applied a 

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mental state requirement to a jurisdictional element, we 

“assume that Congress wanted such an element to stand outside 

the otherwise applicable mens rea requirement.” Id. at 468. In 

other words, we presume that “the existence of the fact that 

confers federal jurisdiction need not be one in the mind of the 

actor at the time he perpetrates the act made criminal by the 

federal statute.” United States v. Feola, 420 U.S. 671, 676 n.9 

(1975). That rule applies even when textual cues might cut the 

other way. In Rehaif, for example, the Supreme Court 

eschewed what it described as the most grammatical reading of 

a criminal statute in order to exempt a jurisdictional element 

from a knowledge requirement that it held applied to textually 

preceding and succeeding statutory terms. Rehaif, 588 U.S. at 

230.

Section 1752(c)(1) supplies the jurisdictional elements for 

Griffin’s statute of conviction. As described above, Section 

1752(c)(1) defines “restricted buildings or grounds” to include 

“any posted, cordoned off, or otherwise restricted area” of the 

White House, the Vice President’s official residence, or their 

grounds; a building or grounds where the President or other 

Secret Service protectee is or will be temporarily visiting; or a 

building or grounds restricted in conjunction with a special 

event of national significance. 18 U.S.C. § 1752(c)(1)(A)-(C). 

Those elements are jurisdictional; they “ensure that the Federal 

Government has the constitutional authority to regulate the 

defendant’s conduct.” Rehaif, 588 U.S. at 230. 

The subsection (c)(1)(A)-(C) requirements narrow the 

criminal offense’s applicability to a small subset of trespassing 

offenses that implicate both the personal security of the most 

high-profile federal officials and their foreign counterparts 

when they visit the United States, and also, necessarily, the 

national security of the United States. See Wood v. Moss, 572 

U.S. 744, 748 (2014) (citing Watts v. United States, 394 U.S. 

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27

705, 707 (1969)) (recognizing that “safeguarding the 

President” is “of overwhelming importance in our 

constitutional system”). Those requirements thus tie the 

criminal prohibition to Congress’s power to “provide for the 

common Defense and general Welfare of the United States.” 

U.S. Const. art. I, § 8, cl. 1; see H. R. Rep. No. 112-9, at 4 

(2011) (identifying this basis of Congress’s constitutional 

authority in the 2012 amendment to the section). 

The jurisdictional status of the subsection (c)(1) 

requirements is confirmed by their essential role in 

distinguishing a violation of section 1752(a)(1) from the 

familiar, state-law crime of trespass. Without them, section 

1752(a)(1) would impermissibly federalize garden-variety 

trespass—entering or remaining in a restricted area without 

lawful authority—which is “historically a concern of state 

law.” Taggart v. Weinacker’s, Inc., 397 U.S. 223, 227 (1970) 

(Burger, J., concurring); cf. United States v. Lopez, 514 U.S. 

549, 567-68 (1995) (emphasizing federalism’s requirement 

that Congress distinguish between “what is truly national and 

what is truly local,” and only legislate regarding the former). 

With or without the satisfaction of a (c)(1)(A), (B), or (C) 

requirement, the underlying conduct is the same knowing 

trespass. It is the satisfaction of one of the required connections 

to federal national security interests that elevates the conduct 

to a matter upon which Congress has authority to legislate. 

Those subsection (c)(1) requirements are therefore 

jurisdictional in nature. And, under binding Supreme Court 

precedent, if they are “jurisdictional only” they “need not be 

one in the mind of the actor at the time he perpetrates the act 

made criminal by the federal statute.” Feola, 420 U.S. at 676 

n.9. 

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Griffin contends that the subsection (c)(1) requirements 

are not jurisdictional at all, let alone “jurisdictional only,”

because they play a substantive role in defining the prohibited 

conduct. The presence of a Secret Service protectee is “the 

very reason Congress cares to punish such conduct as wrongful 

at all,” Reply Br. 21, Griffin insists, so it cannot be 

jurisdictional. That argument misunderstands the Court’s 

admittedly “mislead[ing]” jurisdictional elements terminology. 

Feola, 420 U.S. at 676 n.9. 

It is often the case that jurisdictional elements “have 

nothing to do with the wrongfulness of the defendant’s 

conduct.” Rehaif, 588 U.S. at 230. The classic example is “a 

standard interstate commerce element, of the kind appearing in 

a great many federal laws.” Torres, 578 U.S. at 471. That 

element “is almost always a simple jurisdictional hook” used 

to “connect[] the congressional exercise of legislative authority 

with . . . the Commerce Clause[] that grants Congress that 

authority.” Id. at 457, 471.

But things are not always so straightforward. Sometimes, 

an element of a federal crime both “makes evident Congress’s 

regulatory power” and also “play[s] a role in defining the 

behavior Congress thought harmful.” Id. at 471. The Supreme 

Court has recognized that such dual-role elements present

“tough questions” concerning whether they are treated as both 

jurisdictional and substantive or as jurisdictional only. Id. at 

470-71. And it has squarely held that the mere fact that a 

statutory element has something to do with the wrongfulness 

of the defendant’s conduct does not necessarily mean that the 

element is not “jurisdictional only.” Feola, 420 U.S. at 676 

n.9. As the Court has explained, “[t]he significance of labeling 

a statutory requirement as ‘jurisdictional’ is not that the 

requirement is viewed as outside the scope of the evil Congress 

intended to forestall.” Id. Rather, as illustrated by Feola, dualUSCA Case #22-3042 Document #2081254 Filed: 10/22/2024 Page 28 of 68
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role elements are nonetheless treated as “jurisdictional only” 

when they (a) implement Congress’s purpose to federalize preexisting state law rather than defining a new substantive crime, 

and (b) do not transform innocent conduct into criminal 

conduct. Id.

In Feola, the Supreme Court considered the scope of the 

knowledge requirement in 18 U.S.C. § 111, which makes it a 

crime to assault a federal officer engaged in the performance of 

his official duties. Feola tried to sell counterfeit drugs to 

undercover federal officers and, when the deal went south, 

assaulted one of them. Feola, 420 U.S. at 674. Feola did not 

know that his victim was a federal officer—or an officer at 

all—so he was “undoubted[ly] surprise[d]” when he was 

charged with, and later convicted of, assaulting a federal 

officer. Id. at 675. But his surprise did not undermine his 

conviction. Deeming the “federal officer” requirement 

jurisdictional, the Court held that section 111 “cannot be 

construed as embodying an unexpressed requirement that an 

assailant be aware that his victim is a federal officer.” Id. at 

684. “All the statute requires is an intent to assault, not an 

intent to assault a federal officer.” Id.

In holding that the victim’s federal officer status was 

“jurisdictional only,” the Court acknowledged that a 

jurisdictional requirement could also be “an element of the 

offense Congress intended to describe and to punish.” Id. at 

676 n.9. Indeed, “a requirement is sufficient to confer 

jurisdiction on the federal courts for what otherwise are state 

crimes precisely because it implicates factors that are an 

appropriate subject for federal concern.” Id. (emphasis added). 

The Court explained that “a mere general policy of deterring 

assaults would probably prove to be an undesirable or 

insufficient basis for federal jurisdiction; but where Congress 

seeks to protect the integrity of federal functions and the safety 

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30

of federal officers, the interest is sufficient to warrant federal 

involvement.” Id. So, “[t]he significance of labeling a 

statutory requirement as ‘jurisdictional’ is not that the 

requirement is viewed as outside the scope of the evil Congress 

intended to forestall, but merely that the existence of the fact 

that confers federal jurisdiction need not be one in the mind of 

the actor at the time he perpetrates the act made criminal by the 

federal statute.” Id. 

The Court thus concluded that the federal-nexus 

requirement was “jurisdictional only” because, in enacting 

section 111, Congress aimed to create a federal forum for the 

prosecution of already-criminalized conduct, rather than to 

create new substantive criminal law. Id. at 683-84. The law 

“in large part . . . duplicat[ed] state proscriptions” with the 

goal of ensuring that “those who killed or assaulted federal 

officers were brought to justice” under the uniform standards 

of federal court, rather than state courts where “state officials 

would not always or necessarily share congressional feelings 

of urgency as to the necessity of prompt and vigorous 

prosecutions of those who violate the safety of the federal 

officer.” Id. Therefore, because the “concept of criminal intent 

does not extend so far as to require that the actor understand 

not only the nature of his act but also its consequence for the 

choice of a judicial forum,” the Court declined to require 

knowledge of federal officers’ status. Id. at 685. Rather, 

despite the fact that Congress’s interest in establishing a federal 

forum was born of its specific concern for “protect[ing] the 

integrity of federal functions and the safety of federal officers,” 

id. at 676 n.9, the Court held that the federal officers’ status 

was “no more germane to the nature of [the assault] than the 

color of the victim’s hair,” id. at 693.

The Court also emphasized that its “interpretation poses 

no risk of unfairness to defendants.” Id. at 685. Even though 

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Feola may have been “surprised to find that his intended victim 

[was] a federal officer in civilian apparel, he nonetheless 

[knew] from the very outset that his planned course of conduct 

[was] wrongful.” Id. The Court distinguished the case from 

“one where legitimate conduct becomes unlawful solely 

because of the identity of the individual or agency affected.” 

Id.; cf. Ruan v. United States, 597 U.S. 450, 460-61 (2022) 

(applying the knowledge requirement in a statute criminalizing 

dispensing of a controlled substance to the element of lack of 

authorization because that “is often the critical thing 

distinguishing wrongful from proper conduct”). In that kind of 

case, the Court suggested, the identity of the victim may not be 

treated as jurisdictional. Feola, 420 U.S. at 685. But where 

the defendant’s planned course of conduct is wrongful from the 

outset, “the offender takes his victim as he finds him.” Id. 

The rule from Feola is thus clear: When an element of a 

criminal offense serves as the basis for Congress’s authority to 

legislate; the offense merely provides federal jurisdiction over 

what was previously a state law offense; and knowledge of the

element is not “essential to the existence of any crime,” United 

States v. Hicks, 15 F.4th 814, 818 (7th Cir. 2021) (emphasis 

added), the element is treated as “jurisdictional only” and 

courts presume that knowledge of that element is not required. 

Feola thus resolves the “tough question” presented by the 

statutory text alone in favor of treating the element regarding a 

Secret Service protectee’s presence as “jurisdictional only.” 

As in Feola, section 1752(a)(1) does not create a substantively 

new criminal offense. Rather, Congress designed it to ensure 

that Secret Service officers did not have to “rely upon the 

assistance of local authorities to arrest persons” who entered 

restricted areas around a protectee. See S. Rep. No. 91-1252, 

at 7 (1970). 

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When it first enacted section 1752 in 1971, Congress 

recognized that “almost everything proscribed in [section 

1752] is presently outlawed in some form or other at the State 

or local level.” Id. Similarly, in amending the statute in 2012 

to include prohibitions on entering the grounds of the White 

House and Vice President’s residence, Congress stressed that 

the Secret Service had previously relied on D.C. trespass law 

to exclude and prosecute White House and Naval Observatory 

intruders. H.R. Rep. No. 112-9, at 2 (2011). Before section 

1752’s enactment, Secret Service officers found it “difficult to 

tell exactly which jurisdiction bears the responsibility for 

detention and prosecution,” and the patchwork of relevant state 

laws that applied depending on the protectee’s location made 

“Secret Service agents unsure of the legal extent of their 

authority and [made] uniform enforcement impossible.” 

S. Rep. No. 91-1252, at 7 (1970). Just as in Feola, the fact that 

section 1752(a)(1) merely federalizes preexisting state or local 

prohibitions makes the basis for restricting the prohibited area 

“jurisdictional only.” That remains true even though the 

enacting Congress was of course motivated by a desire to 

safeguard federal Secret Service protectees, just as the 

Congress that enacted section 111 in Feola was motivated to 

shield federal officers.

Also as in Feola, the prohibited conduct (here, trespass) is 

wrongful regardless of whether it is restricted by federal, state, 

or local law, and it is therefore sufficient that the defendant 

knowingly trespassed on a restricted area. Just as Feola did not 

need to know that the target of his assault was a federal officer, 

so Griffin need not have known that the restriction was 

predicated on the presence of the Vice President. As in Feola, 

our interpretation of section 1752 “poses no risk of unfairness 

to defendants” because a trespasser knows “from the very 

outset that his planned course of conduct is wrongful.” 420 

U.S. at 685. That is true even if he “may be surprised to find” 

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that the restricted area on which he is trespassing is protected 

by federal rather than state law. Id. 

Contrary to the dissent’s view that mens rea requirements 

presumptively apply to each element distinguishing “greater 

and lesser evils,” post at 15-16, the Supreme Court has recently 

reaffirmed that “the purpose of scienter” is to “help[] to 

separate wrongful from innocent acts,” Rehaif, 588 U.S. at 231-

32, and described the mens rea presumption as one that 

normally applies to “statutory elements that criminalize 

otherwise innocent conduct,” id. at 229 (quoting X-Citement 

Video, 513 U.S. at 72). Applying Griffin’s contrary rule would 

also be in tension with decisions of many other courts that 

regularly apply Feola to hold that jurisdictional elements that 

do not criminalize otherwise innocent conduct are 

“jurisdictional only.” Consider just a few examples. 

In United States v. Evans, 74 F.4th 597 (4th Cir. 2023), the 

Fourth Circuit addressed the scope of the knowledge 

requirement in 18 U.S.C. § 1855, which makes it a crime to 

“willfully and without authority, set[] on fire any timber, 

underbrush, or grass or other inflammable material . . . upon 

any lands owned or leased by . . . the United States.” Id. at 601, 

605. The court held that the government need not prove that 

the defendant knew that the land on which he set fire was 

federally owned; it was sufficient that he knowingly set a fire

on the property of another. Id. The court explained that the 

“proscribed arson [wa]s the culpable conduct”; the statutory 

requirement that the fire be set ablaze on federally owned lands

merely brought that “culpable conduct within the United 

States’ jurisdiction” by tying the offense to Congress’s 

constitutional power to regulate federal land. Evans, 74 F.4th 

at 605, 606. And the jurisdictional nature of the federalownership element was “confirm[ed]” by the fact that it “is not 

an element that ‘separate[s] wrongful conduct from innocent 

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34

acts.’” Id. (quoting Ruan, 597 U.S. at 458). So, too, here, 

subsection (c)(1)(B) ties the trespassing offense to Congress’s 

authority to regulate in the national security arena, and 

trespassing on an area that one knows is restricted is wrongful, 

regardless of why the area is restricted. See also United States 

v. Quarrell, 310 F.3d 664, 671-74 (10th Cir. 2002) (holding 

that a defendant convicted of knowingly and without 

authorization excavating archaeological resources from public 

or Indian lands was not required to know the specified 

ownership of the land because “[o]ne would anticipate that 

excavating for archaeological resources on another person’s 

land, whether private or public, would not be viewed as an 

innocent act”).

The Second Circuit in United States v. Escalera, 957 F.3d 

122 (2d Cir. 2020), adopted the same approach to a statute that 

criminalizes “knowingly” engaging in conduct “with intent to 

retaliate” against a witness in an “official proceeding,” 18 

U.S.C. § 1513(b)(1), and that separately defines “official 

proceeding” as certain federal proceedings, id. § 1515(a)(1). 

The court held that, for purposes of the conduct or actus reus, 

the government had to prove that the victim of the defendant’s 

retaliation had testified in an “official proceeding” as defined 

in the statute—“a proceeding before a judge or court of the 

United States.” Escalera, 957 F.3d at 128-34. But for the 

mental state or mens rea, the government needed only to prove 

the defendant knew the witness had testified in a “court.” Id. 

In so holding, the Second Circuit emphasized that “[i]t is not as 

if Congress deemed retaliatory assaults on witnesses in state 

proceedings to be innocent conduct which would be worthy of 

prohibition only if a federal proceeding were involved.” Id. at 

133. Rather, the purpose of section 1513 is to “ensure that the 

Federal Government does all that is possible . . . to assist 

victims and witnesses of crime.” Id. (quoting Victim and 

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35

Witness Protection Act of 1982, Pub. L. No. 97-291 § 2(b), 96 

Stat. 1248 (1982)). 

Under the Feola line of cases, the requirements in section 

1752(c)(1)(A)-(C) serve as jurisdictional hooks, and 

knowledge that any of those requirements is satisfied is 

unnecessary to render criminal the underlying conduct: 

knowing trespass on property where the defendant is aware he 

is not authorized to be. As in the above cases, the defendant 

must know he is engaged in culpable conduct—trespassing—

but he need not know the precise basis for federal regulation of 

that conduct.

Griffin contends that, even if attaching “knowingly” to the 

subsection (c)(1) requirements is not necessary to avoid 

criminalizing otherwise innocent conduct, the satisfaction of 

those requirements increases the severity of the conduct and 

resulting penalty. He thus argues that the government should 

be required to prove he was aware of the presence of a Secret 

Service protectee because knowledge of that fact would 

increase his culpability. See Griffin 28(j) Ltr. at 2 (Jan. 6, 

2024). But there is no doctrinal basis for presuming that a 

knowledge requirement attaches to every factor that might 

render a crime more serious. And, in any event, the penalties 

under section 1752(a)(1) are not categorially more severe than 

under state trespass laws.

Consider the statute at issue in Feola. Assaulting an 

officer is generally a more serious crime than assaulting a 

private citizen. Both are plainly wrongful, but assaulting a 

federal officer imperils the success of the federal objectives he 

is serving as well as his own personal safety. So, too, with the 

statute prohibiting false statements within the jurisdiction of 

the federal government at issue in United States v. Yermian, 

468 U.S. 63 (1984). Because of its high stakes for the public 

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36

trust, lying to a federal agency on a security clearance 

application is generally culpable in a way that lying about 

similar matters to a private employer is not. Yet the Supreme 

Court held in each of those cases that facts establishing the 

federal nexus were jurisdictional and not subject to the statute’s 

knowledge requirements.

In United States v. Burwell, 690 F.3d 500 (D.C. Cir. 2012) 

(en banc), we rejected the same argument now raised by 

Griffin. In that case, the court held that 18 U.S.C. 

§ 924(c)(1)(B)(ii), which imposes a “term of imprisonment of 

not less than 30 years” for a person who “possess[es] . . . a 

machinegun” “during . . . any crime of violence”—a 

substantive rather than jurisdictional provision—does not 

require “the government to prove that the defendant knew the 

weapon he was carrying was capable of firing automatically.” 

Id. at 502. That was so, we held, even though the fact that the 

firearm could fire automatically, and was therefore a 

machinegun, ratcheted up the defendant’s crime of conviction 

to a mandatory 30-year sentence. Id. at 516.

In a dissenting opinion, then-Judge Kavanaugh argued that 

the presumption in favor of scienter “applies both when 

necessary to avoid criminalizing apparently innocent conduct 

(when the defendant would be innocent if the facts were as the 

defendant believed) and when necessary to avoid convicting 

the defendant of a more serious offense for apparently less 

serious criminal conduct.” Burwell, 690 F.3d at 529 

(Kavanaugh, J., dissenting). (His dissent did not address 

whether his analysis would be any different if the machinegun 

element were jurisdictional.) But the en banc majority rejected

that proposed rule as unsupported by Supreme Court precedent. 

Id. at 516 (maj. op.). The fact that the type of firearm defendant 

Burwell used increased the offense’s severity did not mean the 

government had to prove that he knew it was a machinegun. 

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37

Id. We similarly held in United States v. Morgan, 45 F.4th 192, 

205-09 (D.C. Cir. 2022), that a conviction under 18 U.S.C. 

§ 2423(a), which prohibits “knowingly transport[ing] an 

individual who has not attained the age of 18 years” interstate 

to engage in sex offenses, did not require proof of the 

defendant’s knowledge of the victim’s minor age, even though 

a sex offense involving a minor typically carries harsher 

penalties than one involving an adult. That principle applies 

with all the more force here, where the element increasing 

sentence severity is jurisdictional only.

Nor is it apparent that defendants like Griffin will be 

exposed to sentences disproportionate to their culpability. 

Barring aggravating factors not applicable to Griffin, section 

1752 imposes a maximum of one year’s imprisonment for 

violating subsection (a). See 18 U.S.C. § 1752(b). Similar 

penalties attach to state trespassing laws on which the Secret 

Service would otherwise have to rely for arrest and prosecution 

of those who breach a security perimeter around a protectee. 

For example, the District of Columbia imposes a six-month 

maximum for trespass, see D.C. Code § 22-3302(b), and 

trespassing in Virginia is punishable by up to one year of 

imprisonment, see Va. Code Ann. §§ 18.2-11, -119.

To the extent that the maximum period of incarceration 

under section 1752 is higher than state trespassing laws 

typically provide, the same was true in Feola, where the 

maximum penalties imposed by section 111 exceeded states’ 

penalties for simple assault. See Feola, 420 U.S. at 702-03 

(Stewart, J., dissenting). The Court’s analysis in Feola was 

unaffected by that maximum-penalty disparity because “the 

offender takes his victim as he finds him.” Id. at 685. So too 

in Burwell, where the status of a firearm as a machinegun 

“skyrocket[ed]” the mandatory sentence from five to thirty 

years’ imprisonment, Burwell, 690 F.3d at 503, and Morgan, 

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38

where the juvenile status of the transported individual boosted 

the sentence imposed from a maximum of ten years’ 

imprisonment to a minimum of ten years and up to life. See 

Morgan, 45 F.4th at 205, 208-09.

The availability of up to a year’s incarceration does not 

support Griffin’s dramatically narrowed reading of section

1752(a)(1). Concerns about ensnaring relatively mild conduct, 

such as “stepping over temporary plastic fencing just outside 

the Capitol grounds on January 5, 2021, to save a few steps on 

a walk home from work,” post at 10, could equally be levelled 

at the ordinary trespass laws of myriad states and localities with 

similar terms of incarceration. But we can readily assume that 

people in Virginia ignore “no trespassing” signs with some 

frequency “to save a few steps” without doubting that the 

Virginia legislature intended to criminalize simple trespass.

Recent experience in this Circuit demonstrates that 

violators of section 1752(a) are typically sentenced to far less 

time than the statutory maximum. The Sentencing Guidelines 

recommend imposing a sentence of zero to six months for a 

defendant without prior criminal history convicted of violating 

section 1752(a)(1). Nearly every defendant charged in 

connection with the events of January 6 and sentenced solely 

for violation of section 1752(a) has been sentenced to fewer 

than six months’ incarceration—to the extent they were 

sentenced to jail time at all. See U.S. Attorney’s Office for the 

District of Columbia, Sentences Imposed in Cases Arising out 

of the Events of January 6, 2021 (updated October 7, 2024), 

available at https://www.justice.gov/usao-dc/capitol-breachcases [https://perma.cc/6PYL-KAB7]. Griffin was sentenced 

to fourteen days’ imprisonment. Even those January 6-related 

defendants convicted of a section 1752 offense involving 

possession of “deadly or dangerous weapon[s] or firearm[s],” 

18 U.S.C. § 1752(b)(1)(A), carrying a ten-year maximum 

USCA Case #22-3042 Document #2081254 Filed: 10/22/2024 Page 38 of 68
39

prison sentence, have all been sentenced to less than one year 

of imprisonment or to probation alone. See id.

In sum, the basis of the Secret Service’s authority to

prevent access to designated areas for the safety of its 

protectees is a “jurisdictional only” element of a section 

1752(a)(1) federal trespass offense. It need not be in the mind 

of the trespasser. The relative seriousness of trespass in an area 

protected by the Secret Service, and the potential for somewhat 

greater punishment than for typical trespass, does not alter the 

analysis where, as here, the prohibited conduct is wrongful 

whether or not federal criminal law applies.

b.

In addition to the jurisdictional character of the subsection 

(c)(1) requirements, a second rule guiding our interpretation of 

criminal statutes’ state-of-mind requirements similarly 

disfavors requiring proof of knowledge of a Secret Service 

protectee’s presence in the restricted area. Courts decline to 

extend even explicit state-of-mind requirements to statutory 

elements when “context” disfavors doing so. Morgan, 45 F.4th 

at 206-08;see also Rehaif, 588 U.S. at 229-30 (noting that there 

can be a “convincing reason to depart from the ordinary 

presumption in favor of scienter”); Hicks, 15 F.4th at 817-18

(holding that a defendant’s knowledge that the money he stole 

belonged to the government was jurisdictional only, in part 

because a contrary interpretation would undercut the statute’s 

purpose of protecting federal property used in an undercover 

operation). The context of section 1752—a law originally 

enacted to create Secret Service-controlled security zones 

around the President in response to nationwide alarm over a 

spate of high-profile political assassinations—demonstrates 

that Congress intended the statute to cover all knowing 

trespasses into those restricted areas.

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40

First, section 1752’s drafting and legislative history make 

clear that Congress never intended “knowingly” to extend to 

the reason for the area’s restriction. The original version of 

section 1752(a)(1)(ii) made it unlawful “knowingly to enter or 

remain in ... any posted, cordoned off, or otherwise restricted 

area of a building or grounds where the President is or will be 

temporarily visiting.” 18 U.S.C. § 1752(a)(1) (1971). In 

describing the wording of that provision, the Senate Judiciary 

Committee addressed the concern that the public would lack 

adequate notice of a restricted area’s boundary because there 

would be no “written public notice” in the Federal Register

defining the temporarily restricted areas (as the statute requires 

for the President’s official residences and offices). S. Rep. No. 

91-1252, at 9 (1970). In the Committee’s view, that concern 

was adequately allayed by the fact that the Secret Service “will

make every effort, consistent with Presidential security, to 

make such restricted areas known to the public (i.e., by posting 

or cordoning off),” and that individuals would be subject to 

criminal prosecution only if they “‘knowingly and willfully’ 

violate[] the restricted area.” Id. 

The Senate Committee’s expressed satisfaction with the 

requisite actual knowledge as to the boundary of the restricted 

area makes clear that prosecution under section 1752(a)(1)(ii) 

is inappropriate if an individual does not know that the area is 

“posted, cordoned off, or otherwise restricted.” The lack of any 

mention of an individual’s knowledge of the reason for the 

restriction—the President’s actual or expected presence—

makes equally clear that Congress did not intend the 

“knowingly” requirement to extend to the reason for the 

restriction. Indeed, the Committee’s reference to the 

requirement of subjective knowledge of an area’s restriction, 

and to the Secret Service making “every effort” at providing 

public notice only to the extent “consistent with Presidential 

security,” reinforces that Congress did not intend to also 

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41

require the Secret Service to announce to the public the precise 

location of the President in order to be able to enforce access 

restrictions on areas surrounding him.

As discussed above, in 1982, Congress expanded section 

1752(a)(1)(ii) to cover other Secret Service protectees in 

addition to the President. See Pub. L. No. 97-308, 96 Stat. 

1451, 1451-52 (1982). As part of its 2012 amendments, 

Congress also implemented a “technical improvement[]” to 

streamline the increasingly cumbersome statutory language by 

moving into subsection (c) the identification of the three Secret 

Service-protected areas justifying federal restriction. H.R. 

Rep. No. 112-9, at 1-2; see also Pub. L. No. 112-98, 126 Stat. 

263, 263-64 (2012). That change yielded the statute’s current 

form, which spells out criminal offense conduct in subsection 

(a) and defines the term “restricted buildings or grounds” in 

subsection (c)(1). But neither that act of legislative 

housekeeping, nor Congress’s addition of other Secret Service 

protectees to section 1752(a)(1)(ii) in 1982, changes the mens 

rea requirement of that section to encompass the reason that 

the building or grounds is “posted, cordoned off, or otherwise 

restricted.”

Second, applying a mens rea requirement to the reason for 

the restriction would undercut section 1752(a)(1)’s manifest

protective purpose. To require proof that a defendant “know” 

that a Secret Service protectee is or would be in the restricted 

area would pointlessly hinder the Secret Service’s ability to 

defend national leaders from would-be assassins and encumber 

prosecution of persons whose knowing trespasses endanger 

persons under Secret Service protection. Section 1752 

empowers the Secret Service to ensure a secure perimeter 

around the President, other national leaders, and their families

wherever they may travel. The nature of the risk against which 

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42

section 1752 guards strongly disfavors Griffin’s interpretation 

of the statute. 

Requiring proof that a defendant knew the reason for his 

exclusion would render the statute ineffective in circumstances 

in which Congress plainly intended it to apply. In enacting and 

amending section 1752, Congress’s particular concern was to 

empower the Secret Service to arrest and expel those who 

breach security perimeters—so-called “zones of protection”—

around the nation’s leaders. See S. Rep. 91-1252, at 7 (1970); 

Zones of Protection: Hearing on H.R. 4468 Before the H. 

Comm. on the Judiciary, 97th Cong. 5, at 11 (1981). As the 

district court reasoned, it is “[un]imagin[able] that a provision

that is looking to protect Secret Service protectees would

require the Secret Service to somehow be telling people and

proving that people knew which protectee was in the restricted

area at what time.” J.A. 534.

But, under Griffin’s reading, officers could not necessarily 

rely on section 1752 to stop and arrest anyone who breaches a 

restricted area; before doing so, they would need “at least some 

evidence supporting” the trespasser’s knowledge of the 

protectee’s presence. Hall v. Dist. of Columbia, 867 F.3d 138, 

154 (D.C. Cir. 2017). In effect, Griffin would burden Secret 

Service agents protecting the perimeter around the President or 

other leader with the additional task of alerting members of the 

public who might breach the area that a Secret Service 

protectee is inside. Even an instruction from someone clearly 

identifiable as a Secret Service agent not to cross the perimeter 

would not suffice under Griffin’s reading of the statute to 

ensure a potential intruder “knows” a protectee is present.

Griffin minimizes the constraint his reading imposes by 

suggesting that officers could post “Secret Service ‘restricted 

building or grounds’ signage” around the areas they secure. 

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43

Griffin Br. 54-55. It is not clear, however, that a generic 

“Secret Service—Keep Out” sign could prove knowledge of 

the facts identified in subsection (c)(1)(B). The requirements 

of the statute as Griffin reads it would be unmet by proof that a 

defendant knowingly entered or remained without lawful 

authority in any building or grounds that he generally knew to 

have been placed under restriction by the Secret Service. His 

own logic is more demanding, calling for proof that the 

defendant knew the distinct facts supporting the restriction he 

violated: that the restricted area he entered was the White 

House or Vice President’s residence or their grounds 

(subsection (c)(1)(A)); or that a Secret Service protectee was 

or would be temporarily visiting the restricted area (subsection 

(c)(1)(B)); or that the area was restricted in conjunction with a 

“special event of national significance” (subsection (c)(1)(C)). 

His suggestion of a less cumbersome way to meet it tacitly 

acknowledges the implausibility of his highly detailed 

knowledge requirement. Griffin cannot have it both ways.

In any event, Griffin’s suggestion of generic Secret 

Service signage underscores the defect of his argument. To 

provide security for its protectees as they travel throughout the 

United States, the Secret Service often works with other federal 

law enforcement entities like the Capitol Police, and with state 

and local law enforcement agencies. Griffin’s interpretation 

would require the Secret Service to call on local partners to use 

specialized “Secret Service” notices, rather than the signage 

they routinely use, like the “Area Closed by Order of the United 

States Capitol Police Board” notices posted on January 6. 

Congress could not have intended that the security perimeters 

it authorized to protect the nation’s top political leadership 

would function only if the Secret Service provided signs 

specifying the particular reason for the Secret Service’s 

involvement and prevailed on its state and local partners to use 

them. 

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44

Griffin’s approach would surely hinder the Secret 

Service’s capacity to handle the full range of potential threats. 

Congress’s intent in enacting and amending the statute was to 

provide the Secret Service with consistent and effective 

federal-law tools so it would no longer have to rely on uneven 

protections of state law. But, by requiring proof that each 

intruder knew “the President or other person protected by the 

Secret Service is or will be temporarily visiting,” Griffin’s 

reading would make a section 1752(a)(1) violation 

significantly harder to prove than its state-law counterparts. 

That added proof burden might not hinder the Secret Service’s

ability to detain and prosecute someone who breached a 

security perimeter with the avowed intent to confront a 

particular protectee. But, as the events of January 6 illustrate, 

Griffin’s reading would substantially undercut the Secret 

Service’s ability to fulfill its protective mission in volatile 

situations where potential intruders outnumber agents. More 

broadly, his reading would embolden people to breach Secret 

Service zones of protection with confidence that, so long as no 

agent tells them the reason the area is cordoned off (and they 

keep under wraps such knowledge they might have from other 

sources), section 1752(a)(1) will not reach them.

* * *

In sum, Congress’s clear purpose in enacting section 

1752(a)(1) was to establish a uniform federal trespass 

misdemeanor to help the Secret Service protect national 

leadership from harm. We reject Griffin’s reading, which is so 

squarely at odds with that clear purpose. We have no basis to 

conclude that Congress intended to undermine its vital aim by 

requiring proof that an intruder knew, when he breached a 

federally restricted area, that a Secret Service protectee was or 

would be present. The statutory text does not compel that 

reading, facts that support Congress’s authority to legislate are 

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45

assumed to “stand outside the otherwise applicable mens rea

requirement,” Torres, 578 U.S. at 468, and the conduct is 

independently culpable.

III.

To recap, we hold that the trial evidence sufficed to prove 

that the Capitol grounds were “posted, cordoned off, or 

otherwise restricted” under section 1752(c)(1), and that Griffin 

knew they were so restricted when he entered and remained 

there. We further hold that the government was not required to 

prove that Griffin knew when he entered and remained in the 

restricted area that Vice President Pence was still there.

For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the district 

court is affirmed. 

So ordered.

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KATSAS, Circuit Judge, dissenting: This appeal turns on 

the scope of an express knowledge requirement in a criminal 

statute that protects the President, the Vice President, and other 

high officials from trespassers. The statute prohibits

knowingly entering a “restricted building or grounds,” 18 

U.S.C. § 1752(a)(1), which is a defined term. First, the area

must be “posted, cordoned off, or otherwise restricted.” Id.

§ 1752(c)(1). Second, as relevant here, it must be one where 

“the President or other person protected by the Secret Service 

is or will be temporarily visiting.” Id. § 1752(c)(1)(B). The 

question presented is whether a defendant, to be convicted 

under section 1752(a)(1), must know that the “restricted 

building or grounds” satisfies one or both elements of this

statutory definition. My colleagues hold that a defendant must 

know that the area satisfies the first element of the definition

but need not know that it satisfies the second. In my view, the 

defendant must know that the area satisfies both elements.

I

During the riot on January 6, 2021, Couy Griffin entered 

the grounds of the United States Capitol and made his way onto 

the inaugural stage. At that time, entry into the grounds was 

restricted because Congress was scheduled to count the votes 

of the presidential electors. When Griffin entered the restricted 

grounds, Vice President Michael Pence, a Secret Service

protectee, was inside the Capitol to preside over the vote count.

Griffin was charged with knowingly entering a “restricted 

building or grounds,” in violation of section 1752(a)(1), and 

with knowingly engaging in disorderly conduct inside a 

“restricted building or grounds” with intent to disrupt 

government business, in violation of section 1752(a)(2). 

During a bench trial, the district court held that these offenses 

do not require proof that the defendant knew the “restricted 

building or grounds” satisfies the statutory definition of that 

term. The court found that Griffin had entered an area where 

USCA Case #22-3042 Document #2081254 Filed: 10/22/2024 Page 46 of 68
2 

he “knew he shouldn’t be,” J.A. 537, but it made no finding 

whether Griffin knew that the Vice President was or would 

soon be present. The court further found that Griffin had 

neither engaged in any disorderly conduct nor intended to 

disrupt Congress. Based on these findings, the court convicted 

Griffin on the first count and acquitted him on the second. 

Griffin appealed the conviction. 

II

Section 1752 of Title 18 creates five criminal offenses 

requiring acts inside a “restricted building or grounds.” 18 

U.S.C. § 1752(a). The first offense covers anyone who 

“knowingly enters or remains in any restricted building or 

grounds without lawful authority to do so.” Id. § 1752(a)(1). 

Section 1752 expressly defines the term “restricted building or 

grounds.” As used in that provision: 

[T]he term “restricted buildings or grounds” means any 

posted, cordoned off, or otherwise restricted area— 

(A) of the White House or its grounds, or the Vice 

President’s official residence or its grounds; 

(B) of a building or grounds where the President 

or other person protected by the Secret Service is 

or will be temporarily visiting; or

(C) of a building or grounds so restricted in 

conjunction with an event designated as a special 

event of national significance[.] 

USCA Case #22-3042 Document #2081254 Filed: 10/22/2024 Page 47 of 68
3 

Id. § 1752(c)(1).1

The parties dispute the extent of knowledge a defendant 

must have about the “restricted building or grounds” to be

properly convicted under section 1752. They agree the 

defendant must know that the area satisfies the first element of 

the statutory definition—i.e., he must know that the area was 

“posted, cordoned off, or otherwise restricted.” 18 U.S.C. 

§ 1752(c)(1); see Appellee Br. at 42–43. According to Griffin, 

the defendant also must know that the restricted area satisfies 

the second element of the definition. Here, in other words, 

Griffin had to know that the restricted area was one where the 

Vice President, who is protected by the Secret Service, was or 

would be “temporarily visiting.” 18 U.S.C. § 1752(c)(1)(B).2

A 

In my view, statutory text, history, and basic interpretive 

presumptions all point in the same direction: To be convicted 

1

 In section 1752, the substantive offenses involve misconduct 

in any “restricted building or grounds,” while the definition covers 

the term “restricted buildings or grounds,” with buildings in the 

plural. The slight difference appears to be a scrivener’s error, and no 

party suggests that it makes any difference here.

2

 The question presented has often arisen in the prosecution of

individuals who trespassed on Capitol grounds on January 6, 2021. 

According to the Department of Justice, prosecutors have obtained 

over 470 convictions under section 1752. In all of these cases, 

criminal liability may turn on whether the defendant had to know that 

Vice President Pence was present at the time of the trespass. The 

district judges in our circuit are deeply divided on that question; six 

have answered yes, while ten have answered no. See United States 

v. Vaglica, No. 23-cr-429, 2024 WL 4244279, at *2 (D.D.C. Sept. 

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4 

of knowingly entering a “restricted building or grounds,” the 

defendant must know that the area in question satisfies the 

statutory definition of that term.

1 

Start with text, grammar, and ordinary English usage. 

These considerations drive the interpretation of federal 

statutes—including criminal ones. See, e.g., Flores-Figueroa 

v. United States, 556 U.S. 646, 650–52 (2009); Jones v. United 

States, 529 U.S. 848, 855 (2000). And here, they strongly 

support Griffin. 

a 

“As a matter of ordinary English grammar, it seems natural 

to read” the word knowingly, if it introduces a criminal 

prohibition, “as applying to all the subsequently listed elements 

of the crime.” Flores-Figueroa, 556 U.S. at 650; see Rehaif v. 

United States, 588 U.S. 225, 230 (2019) (courts “ordinarily 

read a phrase in a criminal statute that introduces the elements 

of a crime with the word ‘knowingly’ as applying that word to 

each element” (quoting Flores-Figueroa, 556 U.S. at 652)); 

United States v. X-Citement Video, Inc., 513 U.S. 64, 79 (1994) 

(Stevens, J., concurring) (“the normal, commonsense reading 

of a subsection of a criminal statute introduced by the word 

‘knowingly’ is to treat that adverb as modifying each of the 

elements of the offense identified in the remainder of the 

subsection”). 

Examples prove this point. An obvious one involves 

knowingly followed by a series of verbs. A provision making 

19, 2024) (collecting rulings); Hr’g Tr., United States v. Mauck, No. 

23-cr-339 (Sept. 27, 2024). 

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5 

it unlawful to “knowingly harass, bother, or intimidate” does 

not reach someone who unknowingly intimidates. See A. 

Scalia & B. Garner, Reading Law: The Interpretation of Legal 

Texts 147–48 (2012) (describing prepositive modifiers). 

Another example involves knowingly followed by a transitive 

verb, then a direct object, then a further limiting prepositional 

phrase. In that instance, the introductory adverb “tells the 

listener how the subject performed the entire action, including 

the object” as limited. Flores-Figueroa, 556 U.S. at 650; see 

also McFadden v. United States, 576 U.S. 186, 191 (2015) 

(“the word ‘knowingly’ applies not just to the statute’s verbs 

but also to the object of those verbs”); Flores-Figueroa, 556 

U.S. at 657 (Scalia, J., concurring in part and concurring in the 

judgment) (once knowingly “is understood to modify the object 

of those verbs, there is no reason to believe it does not extend 

to the phrase which limits that object”). So, “if a bank official 

says, ‘Smith knowingly transferred the funds to his brother’s 

account,’ we would normally understand the bank official’s 

statement as telling us that Smith knew the account was his 

brother’s.” Flores-Figueroa, 556 U.S. at 650. For unless 

context dictates otherwise, it would make little sense to extend

knowingly only to the verb (transferred), rather than carrying it 

through to the direct object (funds) and the limiting 

prepositional phrase (to the brother’s account). See id. at 650–

51. These principles vary and combine—often in obvious 

ways. Consider one other quotidian example: “He knowingly 

pulled over and parked in a no-parking zone.” An ordinary 

English speaker would understand that knowingly applies to 

both verbs (pulled over and parked) and to the particular 

circumstance in which those actions occurred (in a no parking 

zone). Nobody would think that the driver had knowingly 

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6 

pulled over and parked, but may not have known whether he 

was doing so in a prohibited area. 

The Supreme Court repeatedly has applied these principles 

in construing introductory knowledge requirements. For 

example, United States v. Liparota, 471 U.S. 419 (1985), 

involved a statute imposing criminal liability on anyone who 

“knowingly uses, transfers, acquires, alters, or possesses 

coupons or authorization cards in any manner not authorized 

by” the governing positive law. See id. at 420. The Court held 

that this provision reaches only individuals who know that their 

conduct is “not authorized” by law. See id. at 425–28. FloresFigueroa construed a statute imposing criminal liability on 

anyone who “knowingly transfers, possesses, or uses, without 

lawful authority, a means of identification of another person.” 

See 556 U.S. at 647. The Court held that this provision reaches 

only individuals who know that their conduct involves a means 

of identifying “another person.” See id. Invoking “ordinary 

English,” the Court explained that it would make “little sense” 

to criminalize knowingly possessing “a something” unless the 

defendant also knows what that something is. See id. at 650. 

The same principles support extending knowledge

requirements into defined terms and across different statutory 

provisions. Rehaif involved a statute imposing criminal 

liability on anyone who “knowingly violates” certain separate

offenses including 18 U.S.C. § 922(g), which prohibits any 

alien (1) “unlawfully in the United States” from (2) possessing 

any “firearm.” The Supreme Court held that the statute reaches 

only someone who knows he is violating all “material 

elements” of the predicate offense, and it found “no basis to 

interpret ‘knowingly’ as applying to the second § 922(g) 

element but not the first.” 588 U.S. at 230–31; see also United

States v. Games-Perez, 667 F.3d 1136, 1143 (10th Cir. 2012) 

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7 

(Gorsuch, J., concurring) (such an interpretation “defies 

linguistic sense—and not a little grammatical gravity”).

Likewise, McFadden addressed the knowledge 

requirement in the Controlled Substances Act. That statute 

makes it unlawful to “knowingly ... manufacture, distribute, or 

dispense, or possess with intent to manufacture, distribute, or 

dispense, a controlled substance.” 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1). And 

it separately defines the term “controlled substance” as “a drug 

or other substance, or immediate precursor, included in 

schedule I, II, III, IV, or V” of the Act. Id. § 802(6). The 

Supreme Court explained that the substantive prohibition, by 

its “ordinary meaning,” reaches only individuals who know 

that the substance at issue is “listed on the federal drug 

schedules.” See 576 U.S. at 192. In other words, the 

introductory mens rea extends to the elements of the defined 

term, even when they appear in different statutory provisions. 

Finally, United States v. Lucero, 989 F.3d 1088 (9th Cir. 

2021), involved criminal liability under the Clean Water Act. 

One section of that Act imposes criminal liability for

“knowingly” violating a second section, which prohibits the 

“discharge of any pollutant” without a permit. See id. at 1093. 

A third section defines “discharge of pollutants” as adding any 

“pollutant” to “navigable waters” from any “point source.” See 

id. Three other subsections of that section separately define 

each of those three terms. See id. at 1093–94. Faced with these 

terms strung together “like Russian nesting dolls,” id. at 1093, 

the Ninth Circuit held that the criminal provision requires 

knowledge of all “substantive elements” set forth in the 

definition and sub-definitions—thus excluding only a purely 

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8 

“jurisdictional element” that the polluted water must also be 

“waters of the United States.” See id. at 1095–97.

b 

These textual and grammatical principles are dispositive

here. As noted above, the governing statute punishes anyone 

who “knowingly enters or remains in any restricted building or 

grounds.” 18 U.S.C. § 1752(a)(1). The introductory adverb 

knowingly applies not only to the two verbs but also to the

phrase that immediately follows—“any restricted building or 

grounds,” which functions either as the direct object of “enters” 

or as part of a prepositional phrase modifying “remains.” In 

other words, a defendant must know not only that he is entering 

somewhere off-limits; he must know that he is entering a 

“restricted building or grounds” as statutorily defined. See, 

e.g., McFadden, 576 U.S. at 188–89; Flores-Figueroa, 556 

U.S. at 650. And that requires both knowing that the relevant 

area is “posted, cordoned off, or otherwise restricted,” 18 

U.S.C. § 1752(c)(1), and, for January 6 Capitol trespassers,

also knowing that the Vice President was or would be

“temporarily visiting” at the time of the trespass, id.

§ 1752(c)(1)(B). 

My colleagues try to split the difference. They agree the 

defendant must know that the relevant area satisfies the first 

part of the statutory definition—i.e., that the area was “posted, 

cordoned off, or otherwise restricted” at the time of the 

trespass. Ante at 4. But there is no textual or contextual basis 

for projecting the knowledge requirement only halfway 

through the definition. As shown above, it is routine to project 

an introductory adverb like knowingly past the following verbs 

and direct object to prepositional phrases that limit one or the 

other. Faced with a request to do otherwise, the Court in

Flores-Figueroa asked rhetorically: “But how are we to square 

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9 

this reading with the statute’s language?” 556 U.S. at 651–52. 

Likewise, it is common to project knowingly from operative 

text into statutory definitions, as happened in Rehaif, 

McFadden, and Lucero. 

My colleagues object that a mens rea need not travel 

through a “long statutory phrase,” especially one “set forth in 

independent clauses separated by interruptive punctuation.” 

Ante at 21–22 (citing X-Citement Video, 513 U.S. at 68). 

Perhaps not, but section 1752 presents none of those features. 

All agree that knowingly must extend beyond the operative 

verbs (“enters or remains”) to the immediately following 

qualifier (“restricted building or grounds”), which is a defined 

term. And all agree that knowingly must then extend a short 

distance from the prohibition in section 1752(a)(1) to at least 

the first half of the definition in section 1752(c)(1)—a leap 

much smaller than the one recognized in McFadden, from a 

prohibition in section 841 of Title 21 to a definition in section 

802. See 576 U.S. at 192. And once extended into section 

1752(c), why would knowingly stop halfway through the 

definition, immediately after the phrase “any posted, cordoned 

off, or otherwise restricted area—”? That phrase neither stands 

on its own nor adds much to the prohibition on entering or 

remaining in “any restricted building or grounds.” Moreover, 

the second half of the definition, which elaborates on where 

individuals must not trespass, does not feature independent 

clauses. Just the opposite: The three descriptions all begin 

with the preposition “of” and would be sentence fragments if 

severed from the first half of the definition. Finally, the emdash separating the two elements of the definition does not 

serve as interruptive punctuation. In the abstract, an em-dash 

might mark an interruption, a connection, or simply a stylistic 

choice to replace a comma or a colon. See B. Garner, Garner’s 

Modern English Usage 899–900 (5th ed. 2022); Mitchell v. 

Chapman, 343 F.3d 811, 830 (6th Cir. 2003) (em-dash 

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10 

“introduces related provisions”). Here, inserted after a largely 

redundant noun phrase and before several limiting 

prepositional phrases, the em-dash clearly serves to connect. 

Moreover, the ensuing prepositional phrases impose 

significant limits. So, excluding them from the knowledge 

requirement substantially broadens the underlying prohibition. 

For example, it ensnares a hotel guest who walks past an “area 

closed for private event” sign in search of an open bar if, 

unbeknownst to the thirsty interloper, the First Lady is 

expected to attend. See 18 U.S.C. § 3056(a) (Secret Service 

protectees). Likewise, it ensnares an individual who stepped

over temporary plastic fencing just outside the Capitol grounds 

on January 5, 2021, to save a few steps on a walk home from 

work, even if he was unaware of the impending arrival of the 

Vice President. And if that person did so while lawfully 

carrying a firearm, he would face imprisonment of up to ten 

years. See id. § 1752(b)(1)(A). Such improbable breadth 

suggests that something has gone awry. See, e.g., Fischer v. 

United States, 144 S. Ct. 2176, 2189 (2024); Bond v. United 

States, 572 U.S. 844, 860 (2014). 

My colleagues further object with a reductio ad absurdum. 

If section 1752(a)(1) incorporates any element of the defined 

term “restricted building or grounds,” then why not incorporate

every element “all the way down” the entire “definitional line”? 

Ante at 24. After all, the definition of “restricted building or 

grounds” contains three alternative elements after its internal 

em-dash. See 18 U.S.C. § 1752(c)(1). The alternative at issue 

here contains the term “other person protected by the Secret 

Service,” which is separately defined. Id. § 1752(c)(1)(B), 

(c)(2). And the separate definition incorporates yet another 

statute listing eligible protectees. See id. § 1752(c)(2) (citing 

18 U.S.C. § 3056(a)). Plucking out elements from this 

“matryoshka doll of nested statutory references,” ante at 23, 

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11 

one might ask questions such as: For areas meeting the 

definition of “restricted building or grounds” based on an 

“event designated as a special event of national significance,” 

id. § 1752(c)(1)(C), must the defendant know about the 

designation? Because the defined term “other person protected 

by the Secret Service” excludes certain individuals who have 

declined such protection, id. § 1752(c)(2), must the defendant 

know that the individual has not declined the protection? And 

for individuals whose protection depends on obscure details 

such as the age of children of a former President, see id.

§ 3056(a)(4), must the defendant know those details?

In my view, the reductio is unpersuasive. Of course, the 

extension of an introductory mens rea requirement is a question 

of degree. Adverbs do not necessarily modify everything that 

follows. So when knowingly “introduces a long statutory 

phrase,” questions “may reasonably arise about how far into 

the statute the modifier extends.” Rehaif, 588 U.S. at 230. 

Likewise for nested statutory references, reaching the first one 

does not necessarily require reaching all of them. But here, 

there is nothing extravagant about extending the knowledge 

requirement to the simple verb-object phrase that immediately 

follows (“enters or remains in any restricted building or 

grounds”) and then to the straightforward incorporated 

definition (requiring, as relevant here, an area “posted, 

cordoned off, or otherwise restricted” in connection with a 

current or impending visit by someone “protected by the Secret 

Service”). As shown above, the Supreme Court has routinely 

done at least that much, and the Ninth Circuit has done more. 

Moreover, the reductio highlights elements for which 

knowledge may be difficult or impossible to prove—the 

existence of a presidential designation not announced in 

advance, an individual’s acceptance or declination of 

protection, and the age of individuals protected only while they 

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12 

are children. For those elements, closer questions might arise. 

Perhaps the near-impossibility of proving knowledge of some 

element is a contextual clue suggesting that no mens rea 

requirement applies to it. See Scalia & Garner, supra, at 307. 

But those questions, involving definitional elements not at 

issue here, should not obscure what is at issue: knowledge 

about restrictions imposed in connection with a current or 

impending visit by the Vice President, who may not decline 

Secret Service protection and whose status as a protectee is not 

contingent on anything. See 18 U.S.C. § 3056(a)(1). The reach 

of the knowledge requirement is necessarily a line-drawing 

exercise—which my colleagues must recognize in extending 

the knowledge requirement from section 1752(a)(1) to the first 

half of the statutory definition in section 1752(c). Precisely for 

that reason, the reductio falls flat. The only question here is 

whether the knowledge requirement comes to a full stop at the 

em-dash halfway through the definition. As explained above, 

it does not—regardless of how much farther the knowledge 

requirement might or might not extend into nested statutory 

sections besides section 1752(c)(1)(B). 

2 

Statutory history reinforces these points. As originally 

enacted, section 1752 made it unlawful for any person 

“willfully and knowingly to enter or remain in” either of two 

areas, one of which was “any posted, cordoned off, or 

otherwise restricted area of a building or grounds where the 

President is or will be temporarily visiting.” Omnibus Crime 

Control Act of 1970, Pub. L. No. 91-644, § 18, 84 Stat. 1880, 

1891–92 (1971). Under the grammatical principles and 

caselaw discussed above, the introductory mens rea 

requirements (“willfully and knowingly”) plainly extended to 

the relevant verbs (“enter or remain”), object (“area”), and 

immediately ensuing qualifier (“where the President is or will 

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13 

be temporarily visiting”). And the argument for that extension 

would have avoided all of the textual complications invoked 

here by my colleagues: The relevant text was strung together 

without interruption, so there was no question about extending 

an introductory mens rea requirement from a substantive

prohibition to an incorporated definition, compare ante at 23–

24, with Lucero, 989 F.3d at 1095–97, or, within that definition,

about extending the mens rea to text after an intervening emdash, compare United States v. Palomares, 52 F.4th 640, 643 

(5th Cir. 2022) (opinion of Jolly, J.), with id. at 653–54 

(Willett, J., dissenting) and Pulsifer v. United States, 601 U.S. 

124, 171 n.4 (2024) (Gorsuch, J., dissenting). 

Section 1752 has become broader and more complex over 

time, but none of the changes helps the government. Congress 

has extended the statute to Secret Service protectees other than 

the President, see Pub. L. No. 97-308, 96 Stat 1451, 1451 

(1982), and to events designated as nationally significant, see

Pub. L. No. 109-177, § 602, 120 Stat. 192, 252 (2006). But as 

explained above, those amendments (other than the extension 

of section 1752 to the Vice President) are neither directly at 

issue here nor helpful in understanding the provisions that are. 

Moreover, Congress did not move the key requirement at 

issue—that a Secret Service protectee “is or will be temporarily 

visiting” the restricted area—from operative text into a separate 

definition until 2012, when the statute assumed roughly its 

current form. See Pub. L. No. 112-98, § 2, 126 Stat. 263, 263–

64. In the 2012 amendments, use of a separate definition 

avoided the need to repeat the operative text in each of four 

separate paragraphs setting forth four separate offenses. See 

id. And use of an em-dash in the definition avoided the need 

to repeat the phrase “any posted, cordoned off, or otherwise 

restricted area” to describe each of the three categories of 

protected areas. See id. As my colleagues explain, these 

changes served merely to “streamline” a statute that had 

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14

become “increasingly cumbersome” as its coverage expanded.

Ante at 41. Such “legislative housekeeping,” id., did not work 

a sea change by severing the mens rea from offense elements

to which it had previously applied.

Two other changes warrant a brief mention. In 2006, 

Congress increased the maximum authorized penalty for 

violations of section 1752 from six months of imprisonment to 

one year, and it authorized ten years of imprisonment for 

violations while the defendant is carrying a “deadly or 

dangerous weapon or firearm.” Pub. L. No. 109-177, § 602, 

120 Stat. at 252; see 18 U.S.C. § 1752(b). This change 

underscored the substantive difference between section 

1752(a)(1) and simple trespass, thus weakening the 

government’s position even more. See United States v. 

Groseclose, 710 F. Supp. 3d 1, 9 (D.D.C. 2024). Finally, in 

2012, Congress eliminated the separate mens rea requirement 

of acting willfully. See Pub. L. No. 112-98, § 2, 126 Stat. at

263. But that says nothing about the scope of the knowledge 

requirement, which has remained unchanged since 1971.

In sum, the knowledge requirement in the original version 

of section 1752 applied to the requirement of a current or 

impending visit by a protected individual, and none of the later 

amendments undercuts that conclusion.

3

If any doubt on this point remained, two interpretive 

principles would resolve it against the government—the 

presumption of mens rea and the rule of lenity.

The Supreme Court has long recognized a presumption 

that criminal statutes “include broadly applicable scienter 

requirements.” X-Citement Video, 513 U.S. at 70; see, e.g., 

Ruan v. United States, 597 U.S. 450, 457–59 (2022); Staples v. 

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15

United States, 511 U.S. 600, 605–06 (1994); United States v. 

U.S. Gypsum Co., 438 U.S. 422, 436 (1978). The presumption 

reflects a view that crime usually requires the “concurrence of 

an evil-meaning mind with an evil-doing hand,” which 

originated in English common law and “took deep and early 

root in American soil.” Morissette v. United States, 342 U.S. 

246, 251–52 (1952). The presumption “is no provincial or 

transient notion”; rather, it “is as universal and persistent in 

mature systems of law as belief in freedom of the human will 

and a consequent ability and duty of the normal individual to 

choose between good and evil.” Id. at 250.

The presumption applies in two distinct contexts. First, 

courts will read mens rea requirements into criminal statutes 

that “are silent on the required mental state.” Elonis v. United 

States, 575 U.S. 723, 736 (2015); see, e.g., Staples, 511 U.S. at 

605. In doing so, “we read into the statute only that mens rea

which is necessary to separate wrongful conduct from 

otherwise innocent conduct.” Elonis, 575 U.S. at 736 (cleaned 

up); see United States v. Burwell, 690 F.3d 500, 505 (D.C. Cir. 

2012) (en banc). Second, if text and grammar are not 

dispositive, courts will construe express mens rea requirements 

broadly as opposed to narrowly. When a statute is not silent as 

to the mens rea but instead includes a general scienter 

provision, “‘the presumption applies with equal or greater 

force’ to the scope of that provision.” Ruan, 597 U.S. at 458 

(quoting Rehaif, 588 U.S. at 229). Moreover, the Supreme 

Court has “rejected the government’s argument that the 

absence of innocence should circumscribe the reach of an 

explicit mens rea requirement.” Burwell, 690 F.3d at 516

(citing Flores-Figueroa, 556 U.S. at 650–52). So while

express mens rea terms “often” separate wrongful and innocent 

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16

conduct, Ruan, 597 U.S. at 458, they can also separate greater 

and lesser evils.

Needless to say, a trespass that threatens the life or safety 

of the President or the Vice President is substantially more 

culpable than a simple trespass consisting of nothing more than 

knowingly entering an area “posted, cordoned off, or otherwise 

restricted,” 18 U.S.C. § 1752(c)(1). The latter is a local 

misdemeanor offense, D.C. Code § 22-3302, which, if it were 

to occur in the states, Congress would not and could not 

regulate at all, see, e.g., United States v. Morrison, 529 U.S. 

598 (2000); United States v. Lopez, 514 U.S. 549 (1995). The 

former is an urgent matter, which my colleagues aptly describe 

as implicating “the national security of the United States.” 

Ante at 26. And so too are trespasses that threaten the lives of 

other Secret Service protectees, who are leading national 

officials, their immediate families, and their foreign 

counterparts. See 18 U.S.C. § 3056(a).

Finally, consider the rule of lenity. In cases addressing the 

scope of mens rea requirements in criminal statutes, the 

presumption and the rule of lenity work as companion 

principles, both supporting narrow constructions over broad 

ones. See, e.g., U.S. Gypsum Co., 438 U.S. at 437; Liparota, 

471 U.S. at 427–28. On the cutting edge, jurists may disagree 

about which doctrine should predominate. Compare Wooden 

v. United States, 595 U.S. 360, 378–79 (2022) (Kavanaugh, J., 

concurring) (stressing presumption of mens rea), with id. at 

388–92 (Gorsuch, J., concurring in the judgment) (stressing 

lenity). But where the defendant’s proposed construction is as 

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17 

textually plausible as it is here, one or both doctrines should 

remove any lingering doubt. 

B 

My colleagues reason that the definition of “restricted 

building or grounds” is merely jurisdictional and that a broad 

reading of section 1752(a) would best advance its underlying 

purpose. Neither argument seems to me persuasive.

1 

Start with the proper treatment of assertedly jurisdictional 

elements of federal criminal statutes.

a 

The Supreme Court has distinguished between substantive 

and jurisdictional elements. Substantive elements “describe 

the evil Congress seeks to prevent.” Torres v. Lynch, 578 U.S. 

452, 467 (2016). On the other hand, jurisdictional elements 

connect the statute “to one of Congress’s enumerated powers,” 

such as its powers to regulate interstate commerce and federal 

property. Id. Because jurisdictional elements “have nothing to 

do with the wrongfulness of the defendant’s conduct,” they 

“are not subject to the presumption in favor of scienter.” 

Rehaif, 588 U.S. at 230. To the contrary, “when Congress has 

said nothing about the mental state pertaining to a jurisdictional 

element, the default rule flips: Courts assume that Congress 

wanted such an element to stand outside the otherwise 

applicable mens rea requirement.” Torres, 578 U.S. at 468. 

Statutory elements sometimes serve both jurisdictional 

and substantive ends, for “an element that makes evident 

Congress’s regulatory power also might play a role in defining 

the behavior Congress thought harmful.” Torres, 578 U.S. at 

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18 

470–71. In considering such an element, the right question is 

“whether it is jurisdictional only,” not whether it is 

jurisdictional in part. United States v. Feola, 420 U.S. 671, 676 

n.9 (1975); see also United States v. Evans, 74 F.4th 597, 605–

06 (4th Cir. 2023) (“a jurisdictional element only”). In other 

words, so long as a statutory element has something to do “with 

the wrongfulness of the defendant’s conduct,” Rehaif, 588 U.S. 

at 230, courts should not abandon the presumption of mens rea

let alone impose the opposite presumption. Of course, “tough 

questions may lurk on the margins” if it is unclear whether a 

jurisdictional element “also” serves substantive ends. Torres, 

578 U.S. at 470–71. But this is not such a case.

The statutory definition of “restricted building or grounds” 

is not “jurisdictional only.” The first element of the 

definition—that the area in question must be “posted, cordoned 

off, or otherwise restricted”—is entirely substantive; it defines 

the area into which entry is prohibited, and it does not make 

evident the constitutional basis for federal legislation. The 

second element of the governing definition—that a Secret 

Service protectee “is or will be visiting”—serves both 

jurisdictional and substantive ends. It is partly jurisdictional, 

because Congress could not enact a national prohibition on 

simple trespass. And it is partly substantive, because it reflects 

an obvious judgment that trespasses endangering the life or 

safety of the President, the Vice President, or other Secret 

Service protectees are substantially more culpable than is 

trespassing simpliciter. Given that obviously substantive 

purpose, there is no basis for excepting this provision from the 

statutory mens rea requirement.

b 

My colleagues rest their contrary conclusion mainly on 

Feola, which involved a statute prohibiting assaults on federal 

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19

officers performing official duties. See 420 U.S. at 673. The 

Court held that this statute, which includes no express mens rea 

element, does not require knowledge of the victim’s status as a 

federal officer. In concluding that the identity of the victim 

was “jurisdictional only,” id. at 676 n.9, the Court relied 

heavily on a letter from the Attorney General to the Chairman 

of the Senate Judiciary Committee, id. at 680–84. Based on 

that letter, the Court concluded that Congress’s primary 

objective was to create a “federal forum” for prosecuting 

assaults on federal officers, id. at 682, in order to avoid any risk 

that state officials might not prosecute such crimes with 

sufficient “urgency,” id. at 684. The Court specifically 

concluded that Congress had neither intended to “fill a gap in 

existing substantive state law” nor to create a substantive 

“federal aggravated assault statute.” Id. at 683. And if 

Congress had so intended, the Court strongly suggested, the 

statute would presumptively “require[] knowledge of the 

victim’s office.” Id. Finally, in extending its holding to 

conspiracies predicated on the assault statute, the Court 

reiterated its view that the “identity of the proposed victim” 

was “no more germane to the nature” of the assault “than the 

color of the victim’s hair.” Id. at 692–93.

Feola does not support my colleagues’ position. For one 

thing, it involved the question whether to impose a court-made 

mens rea requirement, not any question about the scope of a 

statutory one. For another, section 1752(c) reflects concerns 

that are obviously substantive as well as jurisdictional. As my 

colleagues explain, the statute targets only a “small subset of 

trespassing offenses that implicate both the personal security of 

the most high-profile federal officials and their foreign 

counterparts.” Ante at 26. And section 1752 was enacted in 

the wake of the assassinations of President John Kennedy in 

1963 and presidential candidate Robert Kennedy in 1968. 

Although a letter from the Attorney General pushed the Court

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20

towards concluding that the statute in Feola was “jurisdictional 

only,” a Senate Report accompanying section 1752 cuts 

strongly in the other direction here. Not surprisingly, it

confirmed the urgent substantive imperative to afford special 

protection to one singularly important official: Congress 

sought to “protect the physical safety of the President of the 

United States and the orderly functioning of his Office,” given 

that “[t]wice in th[e] decade, and nine times in our history, the 

Office of the President ha[d] been the subject of an 

assassination attempt.” S. Rep. No. 91-1252, at 3 (1970); see 

also id. at 5 (“[t]he risk of assassination falls most heavily on 

the highest office in our land”); id. at 6 (“we must be sure that 

the President is fully protected at all times against the isolated 

deranged individual”).

My colleagues do not dispute that section 1752(c) serves 

substantive as well as jurisdictional ends. Instead, they read a 

footnote in Feola as establishing that “dual-role elements” 

presumptively lack any mens-rea requirement. Ante at 28–30;

see 420 U.S. at 676 n.9. In all candor, the footnote is hardly a 

model of clarity. But its principal thrust is that a jurisdictional 

element, “precisely because it implicates factors that are an 

appropriate subject for federal concern,” can have substantive 

significance as well, see id., in contrast to purely jurisdictional 

elements such as a reference to interstate commerce, see 

Torres, 578 U.S. at 468; Rehaif, 588 U.S. at 230. And that is 

why the relevant question, as articulated in the footnote and 

applied in the rest of the opinion, “is not whether the 

requirement is jurisdictional” in part, but instead “whether it is 

jurisdictional only.” Feola, 420 U.S. at 676 n.9. My 

colleagues further reason that Feola must cover partly

substantive elements because assaulting a federal officer “is 

generally a more serious crime than assaulting a private 

citizen.” Ante at 35. But the Court reasoned that Congress’s 

concerns were merely forum-based, see 420 U.S. at 682–84, 

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with “the identity” of federal officers as substantively 

“irrelevant” as the color of their hair, see id. at 693. Finally, 

my colleagues invoke Feola’s statement that dispensing with

the mens rea posed “no risk of unfairness” because assaults are

wrongful regardless. Ante at 32; see 420 U.S. at 685. But as 

explained above, the Supreme Court has since rejected the 

contention “that the absence of innocence should circumscribe 

the reach of an explicit mens rea requirement.” See Burwell, 

690 F.3d at 516 (citing Flores-Figueroa, 556 U.S. at 650–52).

My colleagues invoke other precedents besides Feola, but 

none helps their case. United States v. Yermian, 468 U.S. 63 

(1984), turned on the “clear” textual separation between a

jurisdictional element and a statutory mens rea requirement, 

which appeared after and “in a phrase separate from” the 

jurisdictional element. See id. at 68–69. United States v. 

Morgan, 45 F.4th 192 (D.C. Cir. 2022), turned on a special 

presumption against knowledge requirements regarding the 

age of victims in “sex crimes involving minors,” which does 

not involve jurisdictional elements at all. Id. at 206. Burwell

involved the mens rea requirement for a firearms offense 

requiring the weapon at issue to be capable of firing 

automatically, 690 F.3d at 502, which was also not a 

jurisdictional element. And the out-of-circuit precedents 

involved provisions held to be “jurisdictional element[s] only,” 

Evans, 74 F.4th at 606—i.e., elements with no substantive 

significance for the offense at issue. See id. (arson on federal 

lands, assessed relative to background state arson law); United 

States v. Hicks, 15 F.4th 814, 817–18 (7th Cir. 2021) (stealing 

federal property, assessed relative to background state theft 

statutes); United States v. Escalera, 957 F.3d 122, 132–33 (2d 

Cir. 2020) (witness-protection statute for federal proceedings, 

assessed relative to background state witness-protection 

statutes). These decisions do not control a statute that, as 

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enacted, afforded singular and special protection to the 

President.

One final point. Long after Feola, the Supreme Court 

flagged that jurisdictional elements which “also” serve

substantive ends may pose “tough questions.” Torres, 578 U.S. 

at 470–71. If that is a fair characterization of the interpretive

issues surrounding dual-purpose elements, then the rule of 

lenity would resolve this case in Griffin’s favor.

2

Finally, my colleagues seek to avoid any interpretation of 

section 1752 that would “pointlessly hinder the Secret 

Service’s ability to defend national leaders.” Ante at 41. 

Repeatedly, they stress the utmost seriousness of protecting the 

President and other high officials from would-be trespassers. 

Id. at 39–44. This line of argument underscores the substantive 

nature of the requirement that the defendant trespass in an area 

where a Secret Service protectee is or will be present.

The argument also falters on its own terms. Trespassers 

unaware that someone like the President or Vice President is

present are much less likely to pose a threat to those officials

than are individuals who knowingly trespass into an area 

restricted to protect them. My colleagues suggest that the 

January 6 riot reveals a significant practical problem with 

Griffin’s position, given the difficulty of proving that any 

particular trespasser knows a protectee is present. Ante at 43–

44. That concern strikes me as overstated, particularly given 

the number of Capitol trespassers boasting about their desire 

to influence (whether peacefully or otherwise) the Vice 

President’s performance of his official duties. Moreover, the 

seriousness of an offense is reason to insist on, not depart from, 

a mens rea requirement. See, e.g., Staples, 511 U.S. at 616–19. 

And “concerns about practical enforceability are insufficient to 

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outweigh the clarity of the text.” Flores-Figueroa, 556 U.S. at 

656. We should not jettison these principles here.

III

Given its erroneous legal ruling, the district court did not 

make a finding whether Griffin knew that the Vice President 

was still present at the Capitol when Griffin trespassed. Some 

evidence suggests Griffin did not know, such as his later, 

mistaken statement that the Vice President had already certified 

the election before Griffin arrived at the Capitol. Because an 

essential element of the section 1752(a)(1) charge thus remains 

unresolved, I would vacate Griffin’s conviction and remand for 

further findings or proceedings.

IV

On the question of mens rea, section 1752 required the 

government to prove more than just Griffin’s knowledge that 

the Capitol grounds were posted, cordoned off, or otherwise 

restricted. The government also had to prove that Griffin knew, 

when he entered or remained in those restricted grounds, that 

the Vice President was still present. Because my colleagues 

conclude otherwise, I respectfully dissent.3

3 I agree with my colleagues that the Capitol grounds remained 

“posted, cordoned off, or otherwise restricted” even after rioters tore 

down barriers and that there was sufficient evidence supporting the 

district court’s finding that Griffin knew the grounds satisfied this 

element of the definition when he trespassed.

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