Somehow This Element of Criminal Law Confuses the Living Bejeepers Out of Us Americans

From this:

New text messages obtained by the January 6 committee show Trump’s closest circle was strategizing to overturn the 2020 election before the votes were even counted.

Wait a second.  Isn’t attempting to overthrow the United States government a crime?

When we were young, our history books made it fairly clear that treason was a crime whose criminal penalties were equal to that of murder.

Now, this is totally nebulous.  Is it OK, as long as you have enough political support?