On Monday, January 20, 2024, President Donald Trump declared that he was pardoning about 1,500 of his supporters who have been charged in the January 6, 2021, U.S. Capitol attack, using his sweeping clemency powers on his first day back in office to dismantle the largest investigation and prosecution in Justice Department history.
As The Seattle Times reports, Trump also commuted the prison sentences of leaders of the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys convicted of seditious conspiracy for what prosecutors described as plots to keep Trump in power after he lost the 2020 election. Trump is also directing the attorney general to seek the dismissal of about 450 pending cases against Jan. 6 defendants.
For years, Trump has tried to rewrite the history of the January 6 attack that left more than 100 police officers injured and threatened the peaceful transfer of power. The pardons erase the Justice Department’s effort to hold participants accountable over what has been described as one of the darkest days in American history.
These pardons and commutations dismantle the Justice Department’s effort to hold participants accountable over what has been described as one of the darkest days in the country’s history. Trump’s actions will allow for the release from prison of people found guilty of violent attacks on police, as well as leaders of far-right extremist groups convicted of failed plots to keep the Republican in power after he lost the 2020 presidential election.
As The Seattle Times article notes, “casting the rioters as ‘patriots’ and ‘hostages,’ Trump has claimed they were unfairly treated by the Justice Department, which also charged him with federal crimes in two cases he contends were politically motivated.” Enrique Tarrio, the former Proud Boys national chairman who was sentenced to 22 years in prison for seditious conspiracy, is expected to be release immediately from prison.
Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called it “an outrageous insult to our justice system and the heroes who suffered physical scars and emotional trauma as they protected the Capitol, the Congress and the Constitution.”
Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said in an emailed statement: “Donald Trump is ushering in a Golden Age for people that break the law and attempt to overthrow the government.”
Former Metropolitan Police Officer Michael Fanone, who lost consciousness and suffered a heart attack after a rioter shocked him with a stun gun, appeared taken aback to learn from an Associated Press reporter that those who assaulted police officers are among the pardon recipients. “This is what the American people voted for,” he said. “How do you react to something like that?”
The violence on January 6, 2021, has been documented extensively through videos, testimony and other evidence seen by judges and jurors. Police were dragged into the crowd and beaten. Rioters used makeshift weapons to attack police, including flagpoles, a crutch and a hockey stick. Investigators documented several firearms in the crowd, along with knives, a pitchfork, a tomahawk ax, brass knuckle gloves and other weapons. Officers have described in testimony fearing for their lives as members of the mob hurled insults and obscenities at them.
However, with his signature Trump is erasing these crimes and his own part in the attempted insurrection on January 6, 2021.
