Federal prosecutors say this image depicts Nhi Ngoc Mai Le during the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol.
U.S. District Court records
A far southwest suburban woman has been sentenced to 10 days behind bars for entering the U.S. Capitol during the riot on Jan. 6, 2021, where prosecutors say she sat down in a Senate office and had her photo taken with her feet on a desk.
The feds also say Nhi Ngoc Mai Le, 27, of Montgomery twice lied to the FBI about her actions that day. However, her defense attorney insists the Vietnamese woman is not a proficient English speaker and “it is impossible to know what she understood” during those interviews.
Attorney Heather Shaner explained in court records that Mai Le was wrongly led to believe by a Vietnamese “influencer” that “the United States would turn into a communist country” if President Joe Biden won the 2020 presidential election.
Mai Le pleaded guilty in November to disorderly conduct in a Capitol building or grounds, and to parading, demonstrating or picketing in a Capitol building, both misdemeanors. She was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan in Washington, D.C.
Mai Le admitted that, during the riot, she made her way through a crowd and to the upper west terrace on the Senate side of the Capitol, where she took video and photos. She then walked over to the Parliamentarian Door and waited until other rioters forced it open.
Mai Le entered through that door at 2:45 p.m. despite the sound of alarms and presence of police, recorded a video in the Senate office and left the building at 2:50 p.m. Prosecutors say she had another rioter take a picture of her with her feet propped up on a desk inside that Senate office.
Later, during an April 14, 2021 FBI interview, Mai Le falsely denied entering the Capitol and claimed that police walked away and let protesters open one of the doors to the building, according to prosecutors.
Nearly a year later, on March 29, 2022, the FBI confronted Mai Le with photos of herself inside the Capitol during the riot. Mai Le claimed that “she was pushed inside by someone behind her,” records show.
The feds called that a “preposterous, self-serving claim.”
Prosecutors asked for a 30-day sentence and told the judge, “with the 2024 presidential election approaching and many loud voices in the media and online continuing to sow discord and distrust, the potential for a repeat of January 6 looms.”
