Individual convicted in Bessent assassination attempt gets more than 6 years in prison

The person arrested last year in connection with an attempted assassination plot against Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent was sentenced to six years in prison Tuesday, U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro announced. Ryan Michael English, a 24-year-old from South Deerfield, Mass., who goes by Raleigh Jane English, confessed the plot to U.S. Capitol Police outside the legislative building on the afternoon of Jan. 27, 2025. Officers discovered two bottles of “improvised Molotov cocktails” and a knife when they searched English, according to a Capitol Police report of the incident. The U.S. attorney’s office said in a Tuesday press release that English confessed plans to kill a Cabinet member nominee whose confirmation the Senate was scheduled to vote on that day. Senators confirmed Bessent to lead the Treasury Department later that afternoon. Additionally, English informed officers of plans to burn down a think tank based in Washington, D.C., according to the U.S. attorney’s office. “My office will not tolerate attempts to intimidate or harm public officials,” Pirro wrote in a social media post. “The attempt to attack Secretary Scott Bessent was an attack on the democratic process itself and is antithetical to the values we all depend on,” she continued. “The defendant is now a convicted felon and is headed where he belongs: prison.” The Hill has reached out to the Treasury Department for comment.  U.S. District Judge Rudolph Contreras sentenced English to 73 months in prison and th…