Donald Trump’s pledge to pardon January 6 rioters may help fire up his supporters, but several defendants facing federal charges say they no longer believe the former President’s promises.
Even defendants who are holding out hope for clemency are clinging to a false hope. Most of their cases are likely to be resolved in court long before the 2024 presidential election. This week alone, following Trump’s comments, seven people have cut guilty plea deals.
“What we have learned from the year that has gone by, is that my clients, apart from their families and their lawyers who are representing them, is that no help is coming,” Joe McBride, a lawyer representing five riot defendants, including ones in jail, told CNN.
The nationwide manhunt for the hundreds of rioters who descended on the US Capitol has become the largest criminal investigation in US history. Nearly 735 defendants, almost all of whom have professed their support for Trump, are facing charges for joining the attempt to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s electoral college win in the 2020 election, ranging from minor trespassing offenses, to assaulting police, to seditious conspiracy. The probe has also led to an unprecedented government crackdown against right-wing extremist groups, including the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys.
