My name is Larry Klayman, founder of Freedom Watch USA, and I am telling you plainly: Zohran Mamdani will answer for what he has done, and if the Department of Justice won’t make him answer, We the People will.
Mamdani has called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — America’s closest ally — a “war criminal” who belongs at The Hague. He has made clear he intends to use the power of his office against a sitting head of state and against American Jews who support Israel. Meanwhile antisemitic and religiously-motivated violence is rising in his own city, and the DOJ does nothing.
I am not waiting on Washington to act. I never have. I am convening a Citizens’ Grand Jury to hear sworn testimony and determine whether Mamdani should be indicted for incitement and related crimes — using a power older than the Justice Department itself, a power the Supreme Court has confirmed belongs to the American people, not to the bureaucrats too cowardly to use it.
SERVE ON THE CITIZENS’ GRAND JURY
This is the People’s process, run the way the Founders intended — in the open, on the record, under oath. Jurors must swear to deliberate impartially. If you’re ready to stand up and be counted, sign up to serve.
HELP ME SEAT THIS GRAND JURY
Freedom Watch has no billionaire backers. We are the American people’s real Justice Department — and I can only act because patriots like you fund the fight the DOJ refuses to take. Will you rush your most generous tax-deductible gift to help seat this Grand Jury before more blood is spilled?
WHY WE HAVE THE POWER TO DO THIS
My book, “It Takes a Counter-Revolution, Wake Up America!” explains the legal theory behind the Citizens’ Grand Jury in detail. Below, I’ve shared a substantial passage from Chapter 9 of my book, because you deserve to know this isn’t showmanship, it’s the law:
“Short of violent revolution—which will surely come to pass if we do not succeed—there is only one strong legal mechanism that can and must be invoked: the so-called “citizens’ grand jury,” by which Americans themselves can enforce just man-made law and the law of our Creator. This is our only viable peaceful recourse to hold our establishment elitist “rulers” accountable in order to clean house. Over the years, impeachment has not worked nor has any other means to address crimes at the highest levels of executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government.
In this regard, the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution establishes that “no person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury.” A proper understanding of this requirement’s effect begins with the common law, since, as Supreme Court Justice Learned Hand stated in In re Kittle, “we took the [grand jury] as we found it in our English inheritance, and he best serves the Constitution who most faithfully follows its historical significance.”¹⁴¹
The grand jury dates back at least to 1166, under the Norman kings of England. These earliest grand juries were convened to provide answers from local representatives concerning royal property rights but developed into a body of twelve men who presented indictments at the request of either private individuals or the king’s prosecutor.¹⁴² The Magna Carta granted individuals the right to stand before a grand jury to be charged of their crimes.
By 1681, an important characteristic of the grand jury had developed: the rule of secrecy. This characteristic set up the grand jury as a bulwark against government abuse. Grand juries were designed to exclude all outside persons, including the government’s prosecutors, ensuring that all phases of an investigation (not just deliberation) remained secret. Thus, English grand juries functioned to prevent prosecutorial abuses by blocking the king’s attempts to prosecute.
This tradition was continued and expanded by colonial grand juries. In America, the grand jury originally began as a defense against the monarchy and was arguably even more independent than the English grand jury of the 1600s. American grand juries initiated prosecutions against corrupt agents of the government, often in response to complaints from individuals. For example, a Massachusetts grand jury refused to indict the organizers of the Stamp Act rebellion.¹⁴³ Four years later, another Massachusetts grand jury indicted some British soldiers located within the city boundaries for alleged crimes against the colonists but refused to treat certain colonialists who had been charged by the British authorities for inciting desertion in a like manner. Similarly, a Philadelphia grand jury condemned the use of the tea tax to compensate British officials, encouraged a rejection of all British goods, and called for organization with other colonies to demand redress of grievances.
By the dawn of the twentieth century, the powerful role of the grand jury had become established law. In 1902, a Minneapolis grand jury, acting on its own initiative, hired private detectives and collected enough evidence to indict the mayor and force the police chief to resign.
In Frisbie v. United States, Supreme Court Justice David Brewer declared that “in this country it is for the grand jury to investigate any alleged crime, no matter how or by whom suggested to them, and after determining that the evidence is sufficient to justify putting the suspected party on trial, to direct the preparation of the formal charge or indictment.” [157 U.S. 160 (1895)]¹⁴⁴
Again, in Hale v. Henkel, Supreme Court Justice Henry Brown stated that “we deem it entirely clear that under the practice in this country, at least, the examination of witnesses need not be preceded by a presentment or indictment formally drawn up, but that the grand jury may proceed, either upon their own knowledge or upon the examination of witnesses, to inquire for themselves whether a crime cognizable by the court has been committed.” [201 U.S. 43 (1906)]¹⁴⁵
More recently, in United States v. Williams, now deceased Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, writing for the majority, held that:
The grand jury’s functional independence from the Judicial Branch is evident both in the scope of its power to investigate criminal wrongdoing and in the manner in which that power is exercised. “Unlike [a] court, whose jurisdiction is predicated upon a specific case or controversy, the grand jury ‘can investigate merely on suspicion that the law is being violated, or even because it wants assurance that it is not.’” [504 U.S. 36, 48 (1992) (quoting United States v. R. Enterprises, Inc., 498 U.S. 292, 297 (1991))]¹⁴⁶
Speaking of the origins of the grand jury, Scalia also found that:
“The grand jury is mentioned in the Bill of Rights, but not in the body of the Constitution. It has not been textually assigned, therefore, to any of the branches described in the first three Articles. It is a constitutional fixture in its own right. In fact the whole theory of its function is that it belongs to no branch of the institutional government, serving as a kind of buffer or referee between the government and the people. Although the grand jury normally operates, of course, in the courthouse and under judicial auspices, its institutional relationship with the Judicial Branch has been, so to speak, at arm’s length. Judges’ direct involvement in the functioning of the grand jury has generally been confined to the constitutive one of calling the grand jurors together and administering their oaths of office. [Id. at 47]¹⁴⁷
Although the customary practice for summoning a federal grand jury is by a court (see Rule 6 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, or FRCP), such action is mandatory “when the public interest so requires.” Regardless, the FRCP does not preclude citizens from exercising their own rights to impanel grand juries under the Constitution.¹⁴⁸ Thus, it is clear that if citizens themselves can impanel a grand jury, and if a true bill of indictment results, the courts are technically required to commence proceedings, and the executive branch is required to enforce the court’s edicts. However, if the courts refuse and the executive branch does not carry out its duties by, for instance, arresting the criminally accused, Americans do have a right to make “citizens’ arrests, hold trials, and legally mete out punishment in their own right. Indeed, this is what occurred in the western part of the United States, in particular, during our early years as a nation, before there was a developed federal court system and executive branch. Just summon the ghost of Wyatt Earp, now resting in a grave in Colma, California, and he will tell you what can be done!
Given the increasingly corrupt and treasonous actions of our public officials, which have nearly destroyed our republic, and the complete corrupt breakdown of the justice system as run by the government, the time has come for us Americans to rise up and use the God-given rights left to us by our Founders. We can do this by using citizen-empaneled and administered grand juries to hold the highest levels of government in all three branches accountable for the crimes that have driven our nation to the brink of extinction.
And once these indictments come down, citizen courts can try the accused, obtain convictions where there is proof that a crime has been committed “beyond a reasonable doubt,” and then impose just sentences that can be meted out.”
ON CITIZENS ARRESTS
Let me be clear about how we approach the citizens’ grand jury. Citizens do have real legal authority — mostly under state law — to make “citizens’ arrests.” That is settled law, not a fringe theory. But Freedom Watch is not calling on patriots to make arrests themselves. Once our Citizens’ Grand Jury returns its indictments and sentences are handed down, we will commission law enforcement to carry out the arrests. We take this approach because the Trump DOJ has proven to be ineffective and irresponsive at meting out justice against the powerful. When the government fails to act, the People do not stand by — we will see that justice is finally served, through lawful means.
IN CONCLUSION
America cannot go another day allowing a Jihadist-Communist to hold the position of Mayor of our largest city, and use his power to incite hatred and violence. Zohran Mamdani is guilty of criminal incitement, but the DOJ remains silent. This is exactly what the grand jury was built to stop. I am seating this jury. I am hearing this testimony. I am doing what Washington refuses to do.
Freedom Watch is the American people’s private justice department — because when Washington won’t act, We the People still can.
God Save Our Sacred Republic,
Larry Klayman
Chairman, Freedom Watch USA, Inc.
Founder, Freedom Watch USA, Inc. and Judicial Watch, Inc.
