U.S. District Judge James Boasberg on Wednesday ordered that two Jan. 6 defendants who were pardoned by President Donald Trump must be fully reimbursed for the restitution and fines they paid in their earlier criminal cases — a sharp shift from his stance just a few months ago, when he denied their request for repayment.
In a memo order, Boasberg laid out the complicated procedural history involving Cynthia Ballenger and her husband, Christopher Price. Both were convicted on misdemeanor charges related to the Jan. 6, 2021, breach of the U.S. Capitol and were required to pay several hundred dollars each in assessments and restitution.
With the new ruling, the government is now obligated to refund those payments in full.
The change in outcome stems from a combination of an appeals court decision and the unusual timing of Trump’s pardon, which was issued while Ballenger’s and Price’s cases were still on appeal before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.
“Having viewed the question afresh, the court now agrees with the defendants,” Boasberg wrote.
At the time Trump began his second term earlier this year, Ballenger and Price were actively challenging their convictions. Trump then issued a broad pardon covering roughly 1,500 people charged in connection with Jan. 6.
Back in July, Boasberg had rejected their request for a refund of the $570 each had paid in restitution and related fees. The couple later moved for reconsideration, which set the stage for Wednesday’s revised decision.
In his new memo order, Boasberg again cited precedent holding that a presidential pardon, by itself, does not guarantee that a former defendant will recover money or property lost because of a conviction.
“By itself, defendants’ pardon therefore cannot unlock the retroactive return of their payments that they ask for here,” he wrote, noting that this part of his earlier reasoning still stands.
Instead, Boasberg said the key factor was that Ballenger’s and Price’s cases were pending before the D.C. Circuit at the time of the pardon, which “thereby moot[ed] their appeals” and led the appellate court to vacate their convictions entirely.
“So even if defendants’ pardon does not entitle them to refunds, the resulting vacatur of their convictions might,” he explained, adding that this is true regardless of why the vacatur occurs. “In plain English, vacatur — unlike a pardon — ‘wholly nullifie[s]’ the vacated order and ‘wipes the slate clean.'”
Boasberg then went further, examining whether ordering refunds in this context is permissible under the Appropriations Clause and consistent with the doctrine of sovereign immunity, which generally shields the federal government from being sued without its consent.
Ultimately, he concluded that the court does have authority to require repayment.
“Because the court could order defendants to pay assessments and restitution, it can order those payments reversed,” he wrote. “Those are two sides of the same action, and sovereign immunity does not stand in the way.”
The ruling is likely to be embraced by some Trump allies, who have accused Boasberg and other judges who have blocked or limited some of Trump’s initiatives of acting as “activist” jurists.
“Having viewed the question afresh, the Court now agrees with defendants,” Boasberg reiterated Wednesday. “When a conviction is vacated, the government must return any payments exacted because of it.”
Some Democrats in Congress have sharply criticized Trump’s sweeping Jan. 6 pardons. Earlier this year, the late Rep. Gerald Connolly, then the ranking Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, argued in a letter that the pardons effectively let Jan. 6 participants “off the hook” for an estimated $2.7 billion in damages to the U.S. Capitol.
