The obstruction of an official proceeding statute makes it a felony crime punishable by up to 20 years in prison to “obstruct, influence or impede any official proceeding.”
But the law, first passed in the wake of the 2001 Enron scandal, is vague about what constitutes an official proceeding and what conduct would constitute an illegal effort to obstruct one.
the law, as originally conceived in 2002, was intended to criminalize the type of evidence destruction and witness tampering that stymied Congressional investigators during the Enron collapse. It was not meant, they argue, to apply to any form disruptive conduct that interferes with any act of Congress.
But federal prosecutors and lower courts have ruled that the statute’s language is vague enough to encompass the type of disruption that brought the Congressional certification of the 2020 electoral vote to a halt during the Jan. 6 riot.
the court concluded the obstruction charge was only intended to apply in limited circumstances involving tampering with physical evidence. It doesn’t apply to the type of behavior that disrupted Congress’ certification of the 2020 vote, the majority ruled.