By Miriam Raftery
January 21, 2025 (Washington D.C.) – Hours after being sworn into office in the Capitol Rotunda, President Donald Trump issued a sweeping executive order protecting all of the nearly 1,600 people accused or convicted of crimes stemming from the Capitol attack four years earlier. On January 6, 2021, the violent mob assaulted and injured 140 police officers, forcing terrified lawmakers to flee or hide while the mob tried to halt the peaceful transfer of power.
Trump’s order issued a blanket pardon for nearly all of the insurrectionists, erasing their felony records and freeing all who were serving prison sentences, even those convicted of attacking police officers or armed with weapons including firearms, stun guns, flagpoles, fire extinguishers, bike racks, batons, a metal whip, office furniture, pepper spray, bear spray, a tomahawk ax, a hatchet, a hockey stick, knuckle gloves, a baseball bat, a massive “Trump” billboard, “Trump” flags, a pitchfork, pieces of lumber, crutches and even an explosive device.
In addition, he commuted sentences for 14 members of the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys, who were convicted of seditious conspiracy, including the groups’ leaders, Stewart Rhodes and Enrique Tarrio, who were serving 18- and 22- year sentences for their roles in organizing the attacks. Both men are now free.
Trump also directed his Attorney General to drop all remaining charges against individuals accused of crimes related to the January 6 Capitol attack, but whose cases had not yet gone to trial.
Trump mischaracterized those imprisoned as “hostages,” when in fact all were provided with due process and were convicted by juries of their peers of serious crimes, including violent assaults documented on TV and security videos.
Former FBI Director Christopher Wray has called Proud Boys and Oath Keepers “violent extremists” who committed “domestic terrorism” in his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Some Capitol attackers threatened to kill members of Congress and Vice President Mike Pence, even erecting a gallows outside. They also sought to stop certification of electoral college votes, after Trump convinced his followers that the election had been stolen from him. Yet 62 judges, some appointed by Trump, all found no evidence of fraudulent election results.
Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Cailf.), who was House leader during the attack, called Trump’s actions “shameful” and “a betrayal of police officers who put their lives on the line to stop an attempt to subvert the peaceful transfer of power,” NBC News reports.
Trump’s executive order states that it “ends a grave national injustice that has been perpetrated upon the American people over the last four years and begins a process of national healing.
But ABC news reports that some Department of Justice officials have voiced alarm over the prospect of violent convicted offenders going free—potentially able to retaliate with violence against prosecutors, judges or witnesses.