Officers who attended Trump's Jan. 6 rally petition Supreme Court to allow their anonymity in public records

Four Seattle police officers who attended President Trump's "Stop the Steal" rally on Jan. 6, 2021, which preceded the attack on the United States Capitol that day, have petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to keep their names out of public records related to the insurrection. 

The group, which consists of current and former officers at the Seattle Police Department, initially sued the city of Seattle to prohibit Jan. 6 investigative records from being released without their names redacted. But the Washington Supreme Court ruled against them in a decision earlier this year, in which the justices unanimously found the officers failed to show that disclosing their names in public filings would violate their right to privacy, as the lawsuit claimed.

"At its core, this appeal involves whether a government agency can ignore the chilling effect resulting from an employer requiring an employee to disclose their off-duty political activities and attendant impressions or motivations associated therewith, followed by widespread dissemination to those who deliberately seek this information to subject these public servants to vilification without the commission of any misconduct whatsoever," reads the latest petition to the nation's highest court.