A Texas woman who was charged in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot has asked a federal court for permission to travel to Mexico.
The woman, Jenny Cudd, a small-business owner in Midland, Texas, was charged with violent entry or disorderly conduct and entering a restricted building. She livestreamed from within the U.S. Capitol as a pro-Trump mob stormed Congress last month, according to a criminal complaint filed in January. Five people died as a result of the riot.
Cudd's attorneys filed a motion Monday in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., to allow her to travel despite the charges.
"Prior to the alleged offense at issue, Ms. Cudd planned and prepaid for a weekend retreat with her employees for the dates of February 18 through February 21, 2021, in Riviera Maya, Mexico," the motion said. "This is a work-related bonding retreat for employees and their spouses."
Cudd is out on a personal recognizance bond. Under the conditions of her release, she must check in with pretrial services and "stay away" from Washington except for court hearings and meetings with her attorneys.
According to the FBI, Cudd described being part of a crowd that forced its way into the building on Facebook Live. The criminal complaint included a quotation from a recorded statement in which it said Cudd declared, "I f---ing charged the Capitol today" and "Hell yes, I am proud of my actions."
"We just pushed, pushed, and pushed, and yelled 'go' and yelled 'charge.' We just pushed and pushed, and we got it," Cudd said, according to the complaint. She is alleged to have said later, "We did break down Nancy Pelosi's office door."
The complaint said that two days after the riot, Cudd said in a television interview that "we the Patriots did storm the U.S. Capitol" and that she would "absolutely" do it again.
It appears that the FBI is referring to Cudd's interview with NBC affiliate KWES of Midland on Jan 8.
Cudd told KWES that even though she used the word "we" in her Facebook Live post, she did not mean to include herself and that she was using "we" generally. Cudd told KWES that she did not break any laws.
"Those things did happen by other people, but I was not a part of that," Cudd said. "I said in reference to it that 'we the patriots stormed the Capitol,' and some people went into different offices and different things like that."
The attorneys who filed the motion did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Cudd has not yet entered a plea, according to court records.