Trump promised pardons for January 6 rioters in ‘first hour’ of his second term. What might this mean?
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Observers raise alarm about how pardons for convicted Capitol attackers might weaken US criminal justice system. As Donald Trump prepares to return to the White House, politicians, legal observers and even sitting federal judges are expressing alarm about his stated intention to pardon or offer commutations to supporters who attacked the US Capitol on 6 January 2021 and were then convicted of crimes.
Clemency for those who sought to block certification of Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory “would undermine the US judiciary and criminal justice system and send a message to Americans that attacking US democratic institutions is appropriate and justifiable”, said a spokesperson for the Society for the Rule of Law.
The group of conservative attorneys, academics, and former federal officials and judges also quoted sitting judges Royce Lamberth (“We cannot condone the normalization of the January 6 US Capitol riot”) and Carl Nichols, a Trump appointee who said “blanket pardons for all January 6 defendants or anything close would be beyond frustrating and disappointing”.
In December, while sentencing a member of the Oath Keepers militia who pleaded guilty to seditious conspiracy, the most serious charge brought in relation to January 6, the US district court judge Amit Mehta said: “The notion that Stewart Rhodes [the group’s leader, jailed for 18 years on the same charge] could be absolved is frightening and ought to be frightening to anyone who cares about democracy in this country.”.
