A collage of four images, left to right and top to bottom: January 6 rioters scaling the Capitol facade, with inverted black-and-white colors; Rep. Liz Cheney speaking to media, shaded red; A close-up of U.S. and Trump campaign flags, one reading "Trump 2020 No More Bullshit," shaded blue; January 6 rioters scaling the Capitol facade, in black-and-white

Andrea Austria / Media Matters

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Right-wing media figures defend Trump’s clemency for all January 6 participants

Fox’s Lawrence Jones, Laura Ingraham, and other right-wing media figures deflect criticism of the pardons and commutations by pointing to BLM and Joe Biden and downplaying January 6 violence

Written by Jack Winstanley & Payton Armstrong

Published

Right-wing media figures rushed to defend President Donald Trump’s decision to issue pardons or commutations to over 1,500 people who participated in the January 6 insurrection at the United States Capitol — including those convicted of violence against police.

They offered a number of arguments to support their defense: They baselessly claimed legal efforts to hold participants accountable were “show trials” or unfair compared to legal repercussions for the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests, said the pardons are justified because of former President Joe Biden’s pardons, and diminished the violence on January 6 by recasting those criminally charged as “ordinary patriots.”

Other right-wing figures defended the clemency by noting that Trump had campaigned on the issue, declaring, “Promises made, promises kept."

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  • Right-wing media figures spent years urging pardons for January 6 participants, which Trump granted on the first day of his second term

    • Trump issued pardons or commutations on the first day of his second term to over 1,500 participants in the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, including those convicted of violent offenses against law enforcement officers. Trump had stated ahead of his presidency that he intended to issue pardons to some January 6 participants “in the first hour” of his second term. [The Associated Press, 1/21/25; The Guardian, 1/6/25]
    • Right-wing media figures have spent years creating a revisionist history of January 6, claiming that Trump supporters were “set up” and casting attempts to hold participants accountable as politically motivated. Right-wing media figures, initially led by former Fox News host Tucker Carlson, sought to downplay the extent of the day’s violence and substitute a revisionist counternarrative that declared January 6 participants as the victims of a false-flag operation perpetuated by the federal government. When participants were charged with crimes, right-wing figures suggested the prosecutions were evidence that “the major critics of the left have been targeted by lawfare” and referred to defendants as “political prisoners.” [Media Matters, 5/21/24, 2/24/21, 1/3/24; The Associated Press, 1/4/24]
    • Right-wing media also specifically pushed for pardons for January 6 participants for years. Right-wing media figures have been defending January 6 participants since at least February 2022, suggesting that Trump should “pardon every January 6ther," or at least “pardon those people who were nonviolent on January 6.” [Media Matters, 1/20/25, 1/10/25]
    • Prior to Trump’s issuance of the pardons, right-wing media lashed out against now-Vice President JD Vance, who told Fox News that violent January 6 defendants “obviously” should not be pardoned. Following Vance’s January 12 interview, where he suggested the pardons would be selective, right-wing media figures urged the president to “pardon everybody,” recycling claims that the Capitol riot was a “setup” by law enforcement. [Media Matters, 1/28/25, 1/22/25]

  • Right-wing media justified January 6 pardons by claiming that the government “showed mercy” or “nothing happened” to Black Lives Matter protestors in 2020

  • Right-wing media figures have continued to baselessly claim that Black Lives Matter protesters were treated with leniency compared to January 6 participants even though news outlets have debunked the claim and reported that over 17,000 arrests were made in the first two weeks of the BLM protests. Additionally, a report from the City University of New York Law School’s Creating Law Enforcement Accountability & Responsibility Clinic determined that the Trump administration engaged in an “aggressive assertion of federal jurisdiction” over the protests and that many of the federal penalties were “clearly harsher” than applicable state law.

    • Right-wing host Dan Bongino claimed that “the process used to target [J6ers] was clearly political,” arguing that “absolutely nothing happened” when BLM protestors allegedly attacked police at the White House. Bongino stated: “But there is zero doubt that when the White House was attacked by BLM and antifa and Secret Service agents and uniformed division officers I know personally were hurt and wounded, that absolutely nothing happened to these people at all. So you can have two simultaneous thoughts at the same time, and I want you to pay attention to this. You can and should say, ‘I am absolutely, resolutely against attacks on law enforcement for doing their job,’ period there. But I am also against a greater danger, which is a weaponized Justice Department that picks and chooses when they take this stuff seriously and targets political opponents for it. And that’s what happened here.” [Rumble, The Dan Bongino Show, 1/22/25]
    • Fox News host Laura Ingraham complained about outrage over January 6 pardons, saying, “Where was their demand for jail time and their outrage when the George Floyd rioters burned down American cities?” [Fox News, The Ingraham Angle, 1/21/25]
    • Defending the pardons, Fox host Sean Hannity falsely claimed that the government “never prosecuted” Black Lives Matter protestors for the 2020 protests. Hannity lamented that there were “574 riots in the summer of 2020, we had dozens of dead Americans, thousands of injured cops, billions in property damage, we have videotape evidence — they never prosecuted these people.” [Premiere Radio Networks, The Sean Hannity Show, 1/22/25]
    • Right-wing pundit Larry Elder claimed that “absolutely nothing happened” to BLM protesters who attacked cops. Elder: “In the summer of 2020, you got people who were battering police officers and absolutely nothing happened to them.” [Newsmax, Rob Schmitt Tonight, 1/21/25]
    • Fox host Jesse Watters praised the January 6 pardons while claiming that Democrats “showed mercy to BLM after they ransacked and firebombed cities.” [Fox News, Jesse Watters Primetime, 1/22/25]
    • Fox & Friends co-host Lawrence Jones claimed that “there were no charges” for the BLM protests. Jones added: “So, I don't want anybody targeting cops. But I think what ended up happening, according to some of the reports, and I can pretty much confirm it, is when there was some debate going on who to pardon and they kept going back and forth and he said, just pardon them all. I'm not going to do this. If this is your effort to delay me getting the J6ers pardoned, the people that were overcharged, which a lot of legal scholars agree, then I'm just going to pardon them all.” [Fox News, Fox & Friends, 1/23/25]

  • Right-wing media justified the pardons by claiming that the January 6 trials were politically motivated and unfair and that the sentences were excessive

    • Watters praised Trump for issuing a pardon for a man who received 20 years for “punching a cop at a rally that got out of control,” adding, “These guys got squeezed into pleas.” He said: “We don't think you should be able to punch a cop in the face and get away with it, but 20 years is a long time for punching a cop in the face. And these guys got squeezed into pleas.” [Fox News, Jesse Watters Primetime, 1/22/25]
    • Fox host Will Cain claimed that investigations into January 6 participants were “an attempt to cook the books within the DOJ and the FBI to suggest that domestic terrorism was on the rise.” He also stated that, “Real people had their lives ruined. Real people sat and rotted in jail. And Donald Trump, today, for those real people, brought justice.” [Fox News, The Will Cain Show, 1/21/25]
    • During Fox News’ inauguration coverage, Ingraham defended the pardons by claiming “these people were never had the real chance to put on a proper defense” and “documents were destroyed.” Ingraham noted Trump had granted “1,600 pardons for J6ers who were arrested,” adding, “And a lot of them were sentenced to two, three, four, five years in jail. His point is, documents were destroyed, which they were, and these people were never had the real chance to put on a proper defense. That was really big.” [Mediaite, 1/20/25]
    • Ingraham also justified Trump pardoning participants because “a lot of them served years in jail already.” She added, “We know sex assaults of convicts are, you know, go to jail all across this country for a couple of years. Some of these people have been in jail for already four years.” [Fox News, The Ingraham Angle, 1/22/25]
    • Former GOP congresswoman Michelle Bachmann said on FlashPoint that January 6 “was like a prayer meeting” and complained that there were “1,500 people who've been in jail serving time is far in excess of what murderers and rapists have to serve in jail.” Bachmann added, “People were preaching the gospel on the streets. It was like a family reunion. The happiest people you would ever see. There was no discontent on the Capitol Hill that day.” [Victory Channel, FlashPoint, 1/21/25]
    • Right-wing conspiracy theorist Mike Cernovich wrote, “Not one J6’er got a real trial so Trump had to release them all.” He added, “Anyone who has a problem with this can talk to the judges and prosecutors who did Stalin era show trials.” [Twitter/X, 1/21/25; Media Matters, 8/21/18]
    • Right-wing figure Dinesh D’Souza, who has pushed election denial conspiracy theories, called the pardons in an X post “a just outcome” because the trials were “show trials.” He also claimed that “when the process is thoroughly corrupted, everyone is presumed innocent after the fact.” [Twitter/X, 1/21/25; Media Matters, 5/4/22]
    • Former Fox host Bill O’Reilly claimed that “there was prosecutorial misconduct directed at some people who got into this fracas and got punished far beyond their crime.” [Premiere Radio Networks, The Sean Hannity Show, 1/24/25]

  • Right-wing media figures compared Trump’s pardons to Biden’s preemptive pardons for potential targets of the Trump administration

  • Prior to exiting the White House, then-President Joe Biden issued pardons for Dr. Anthony Fauci, retired Gen. Mark Milley, members of the House January 6 committee, and several of his family members in an attempt to protect them against potential reprisals by the incoming Trump administration. Following Trump’s January 6 pardons, right-wing media figures have equated the pardons issued by Biden and Trump, ignoring that the Trump administration had publicly telegraphed its intent to target many of those pardoned by Biden.

    • On Fox Noticias, co-host Julie Banderas questioned why the media is “so focused on the Jan. 6 pardons and not the criminal pardons granted by Joe Biden.” [Fox Deportes, Fox Noticias, 1/22/25]
    • Discussing the potential political fallout of Trump pardoning January 6 participants convicted of violence, Newsweek deputy opinion editor Batya Ungar-Sargon invoked Biden’s preemptive pardons. She said that “what Biden did in terms of pardoning was so utterly egregious and is going to become a massive albatross around the neck of his party in a way that these really aren't for Donald Trump.” [The Free Press, Honestly with Bari Weiss, 1/24/25]
    • Fox anchor Bret Baier likened Biden's preemptive pardons of his family to Trump's pardon of January 6 participants, saying, “What about that, the pardon back and forth between the two presidents?” [Fox News, Special Report with Bret Baier, 1/21/25]

  • Right-wing media figures glossed over violent offenses by January 6 participants, saying Trump pardoned nonviolent “ordinary patriots” who were set up by law enforcement

  • Right-wing media figures have justified Trump’s blanket January 6 pardons by glossing over pardons for those convicted of seditious conspiracy or violent crimes. Approximately 140 police officers were injured that day, and several armed individuals and extremist groups were present.

    • Newsmax’s Greg Kelly excused the pardons as “Donald Trump pardon[ing] vulnerable, not very powerful, regular, ordinary patriots” and claimed that “to the extent he [Enrique Tarrio] did anything wrong, it was a setup, a total and complete setup.” Kelly claimed that Trump pardoned the vulnerable and powerless. He also argued that Tarrio — the leader of the Proud Boys who was convicted of seditious conspiracy — was “just a guy who was being a guy, exercising his constitutional rights.” [Newsmax, Greg Kelly Reports, 1/20/25; NBC News, 1/22/25]
    • Lawrence Jones suggested Trump pardoned people who “didn’t attack officers" or engage in “any actual violence,” failing to mention that several of the pardons went to those who did attack officers. While discussing Trump’s January 6 pardons, Jones alluded to the fact that both Trump and Vance previously implied the pardons would be for people who “didn’t attack officers, if there wasn’t any actual violence.” [Fox News, Fox & Friends First, 1/21/25]
    • Fox News legal editor Kerri Urbahn failed to note that violent offenders were also pardoned when she emphasized “incredibly harsh sentences and penalties for mostly, for most of them, relatively minor offenses." Instead, she highlighted what she implied was over sentencing of “relatively minor offenses like trespassing, misdemeanors, and the like” and called the pardons “great.” [Fox News, Fox & Friends, 1/21/25]
    • Lara Logan, who has pushed conspiracy theories, responded to a post about Stewart Rhodes, leader of the Oath Keepers militia, receiving a pardon and wrote that he was “set-up” and “it was complete BS.” [Twitter/X, 1/21/25; CBS News, 1/22/25; Media Matters, 3/28/22, 10/21/22]

  • Right-wing media figures defended the clemency as a campaign promise Trump fulfilled: “Promises made, promises kept”

    • Rumble host Donald Trump Jr. shared a video of Trump signing the pardons, commenting, “Promises Made, Promises Kept… And we are only just starting.” He also posted, “President Trump has just signed an executive order granting full pardons to about 1,500 J6 prisoners!” [Twitter/X, 1/20/25]
    • Pro-Trump troll Laura Loomer posted, “God bless the J6 patriots and President Trump for pardoning them! Promises made, promises kept!” [Twitter/X, 1/20/25] 
    • On Outnumbered, Fox News contributor Steve Hilton said, “The Trump pardon, whatever you think of them, it's the delivery of an election promise.” He added, “He said he would do this in pretty much every rally. He’s doing what he said. Biden said he would never do anything like this. It's the exact opposite. Trump is doing what he said. Biden is doing the opposite of what he said.” [Fox News, Outnumbered, 1/21/25]
    • Lawrence Jones celebrated the clemency: “Promises made, promises kept on day 1.” He said of Trump: “I think he made pretty clear and JD Vance kind of doubled down on it, if you didn't attack officers, if there wasn't actual violence, and you were caught up within the system, you were overcharged, you’ve done enough time, and he — promises made, promises kept on day 1.” [Fox News, Fox & Friends, 1/21/25]