At least 33 people who received pardons tied to the January 6, 2021, U.S. Capitol riot have since been convicted of, charged with, or arrested in connection with additional crimes, according to a new report from Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee.
Why It Matters
On January 20, 2025—the day of President Donald Trump’s second inauguration—Trump issued pardons to nearly all defendants charged with offenses related to the Capitol riot, totaling more than 1,500 people. Trump argued that the Justice Department treated them unfairly. He said the pardons would end what he described as “a grave national injustice that has been perpetrated upon the American people over the last four years” and start “a process of national reconciliation.”
In their report released Monday, House Judiciary Democrats said the pardons “undermine public safety.”
They argued that by bypassing the U.S. Pardon Attorney and the Justice Department’s traditional review process for clemency, Trump “threw caution to the wind,” commuting more than a thousand years of prison sentences for what they described as serious violent crimes, canceling fines and restitution, removing civil and legal penalties tied to convictions, and releasing hundreds of incarcerated people back into the public despite what they said was a lack of remorse or rehabilitation related to the events of January 6.
What to Know
The report says at least four people who were pardoned for their role in the riot are currently being prosecuted for crimes they allegedly committed before January 6. It also says at least 23 were accused of committing new crimes after the attack, and at least five have been arrested or charged in connection with new crimes since the pardons were issued.
According to the report, the crimes linked to pardoned individuals—before and after January 6—include allegations or convictions involving sexual assault, child sexual assault, production or possession of child pornography, rape, conspiracy to murder FBI agents, kidnapping, aggravated robbery, reckless homicide, DUI causing death, illegal firearms possession, domestic violence by strangulation, burglary, vandalism, grand theft, stalking, violating protective orders, threatening public officials, and drug trafficking.
Names Listed in the Report
House Judiciary Democrats listed the following pardon recipients as having been convicted of, charged with, or arrested in connection with additional crimes since the riot:
- David Daniel
- Andrew Kyle Grisby
- Theodore Middendorf
- Andrew Quentin Taake
- John D. Andries
- Joshua Lee Atwood
- Bryan Betancur
- Dominic Box
- Kyle Travis Colton
- Timothy Desjardins
- James Tate Grant
- Jarod Lee Hawks
- Joshua Dillon Haynes
- Emily Hernandez
- Colby Dillion Herrington
- Daryl Eugene Johnson
- Edward Kelley
- Kene Brian Lazo
- Jia Liu
- Martin Joseph Pastucci
- Donald Nathan Pelham
- Narayana Chandra Rheiner
- Alan Michael St. Onge
- Hatchet Speed
- Taylor Taranto
- Shane Jason Woods
- Miles Adkins
- Zachary Alam
- John Banuelos
- Brent John Holdridge
- Matthew Huttle
- Christopher Moynihan
What People Are Saying
Abigail Jackson, a White House spokesperson, said in a statement to Newsweek: “The media’s continued obsession with January 6 is one of the many reasons trust in the press is at historic lows — they aren’t covering issues that the American people actually care about. President Trump was resoundingly reelected to enact an agenda based on securing the border, driving down crime, and restarting our economy — the President is delivering.”
Representative Jamie Raskin, a Maryland Democrat and ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, wrote on X: “For MAGA, the 1,600 Jan. 6 rioters pardoned by Trump are not white supremacist cop-beaters, violent criminals & seditious conspiracists: they are ‘patriots,’ ‘political prisoners’ & ‘hostages.’ MAGA is rewriting history. Democrats will keep telling the truth, the foundation of democracy.”
