Hundreds of people went to jail for storming the U.S. Capitol to keep Donald Trump in power, despite his election loss in 2020. Now, Mr. Trump – in one of his first acts as a re-elected president – has set them free. It was an alarming move even for some in the Republican-controlled Congress, and among the insurrectionists: At least two of the 1,500-odd people granted clemency have rejected it, saying they know their actions on Jan. 6, 2021, were wrong. Nevertheless, a prosecutor appointed by Mr. Trump has opened an internal review of the Justice Department’s decision to charge hundreds of the defendants with felony obstruction offenses, the Wall Street Journal reported.
As for militia leaders involved in the siege, some Americans are wary of where they will turn next. One has called for retribution; another was temporarily barred from going to Washington, until a federal judge changed course on that. Experts who study extremism, and officers within usually pro-Trump law enforcement agencies, worry that white nationalists will feel free to commit new crimes. The GOP has “lost their claim to having moral high ground when defending our system of governance, the Constitution, and supporting the police,” Aquilino Gonell, a former sergeant on the Capitol force who was injured on Jan. 6, told Reuters.
The U.S. Justice Department has taken down its database of all the people charged in the Capitol attack, but many of the main actors are well-known figures whose actions will be closely scrutinized in the coming months. Here’s a primer on some of them and what they’ve said and done since their release.
Henry (Enrique) Tarrio
Former national chair, Proud Boys | Status: Pardoned
Allison Dinner/The Associated Press
The Proud Boys – deemed a “neo-fascist organization” by the Canadian government, which lists it as a terrorist group – emerged during Mr. Trump’s 2016 campaign, when its ranks of white nationalists targeted the Black Lives Matter movement. Mr. Tarrio was its chairman from 2018 to 2021. Prosecutors allege high-ranking Proud Boys plotted with another group, the Oath Keepers, to disrupt the transfer of presidential power. Mr. Tarrio was no longer in Washington on Jan. 6 – a judge had ordered him to leave town after defacing a BLM banner – but “no organization put more boots on the ground” at the Capitol than the Proud Boys, prosecutors said.
Mr. Tarrio was sentenced to 22 years for seditious conspiracy and other charges including obstruction and civil disorder. Once released, he went on conspiracy theorist Alex Jones’s podcast to call for reprisals: “The people who did this, they need to feel the heat. We need to find and put them behind bars for what they did.”
Zachary Rehl, Ethan Nordean and Joseph Biggs
Regional leaders, Proud Boys | Status: Sentence commuted
Carolyn Kaster/AP; Sam Thomas/Orlando Sentinel via AP
Ethan Nordean, one of Mr. Tarrio’s co-defendants, was “the undisputed leader on the ground on Jan. 6,” prosecutor Jason McCullough said. The man from Washington State, also known as Rufio Panman, belonged to a chapter called the “Ministry of Self Defence,” prosecutors said: He, Joseph Biggs from Florida and Zachary Rehl from Philadelphia allegedly began to conspire in December, 2020, to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s election win, deputizing “rally boys” to storm the Capitol at an agreed-upon time and place. The sentence for seditious conspiracy and other charges was 18 years for Mr. Nordean, 17 for Mr. Biggs and 15 for Mr. Rehl.
Mr. Trump’s clemency order may have freed the trio and “rally boy” Dominic Pezzola from prison, but it does not erase the crimes, so any rules for convicted felons, such as bans on international travel, still apply to them.
Stewart Rhodes
Founder, Oath Keepers | Status: Sentence commuted
Kayla Bartkowski/Getty Images
Mr. Rhodes and his militia – which the army veteran and disbarred lawyer has led since 2009 – cling to a hard-line interpretation of the U.S. Constitution, and have armed themselves to enact it by force if necessary.
Ahead of Jan. 6, Mr. Rhodes, echoing Mr. Trump’s false claims that the election was stolen, talked about a “violent overthrow” of the government, a jury heard at his 2022 trial. He did not enter the Capitol, but prosecutors said he was outside directing fighters in helmets and military gear. He claims the Oath Keepers were never supposed to go in: “My guys blundered through doors.”
Mr. Rhodes was sentenced to 18 years for seditious conspiracy and other charges. His co-defendants Kenneth Harrelson, Jessica Watkins and Thomas Caldwell, while acquitted of seditious conspiracy, were convicted of lesser charges; and in a separate trial, the seditious conspiracy charges stuck against Oath Keepers Roberto Minuta, Edward Vallejo, Joseph Hackett and David Moerschel. All had their sentences commuted by Mr. Trump.
Jacob Chansley
Capitol insurrectionist, unaffiliated | Status: Pardoned
Win McNamee/Getty Images
With his war paint, horned fur hat and spear-tipped flagpole, Mr. Chansley was one of the most recognized faces of the rioters inside the Capitol. For months before that day, the Arizonan and his costumes had been a fixture at rallies for Mr. Trump and against COVID-19 policies. He used to call himself the QAnon Shaman, but later disowned that movement, which imagines an evil cabal that only Mr. Trump can stop by autocratic, violent means.
He pleaded guilty to a felony charge for egging on the mob and served 27 months of a 41-month sentence. When he learned of the pardon from his lawyer, “I walked outside and I screamed ‘freedom’ at the top of my lungs and then gave a good Native American war cry,” he told the BBC.
Richard Barnett
Capitol insurrectionist, unaffiliated | Status: Pardoned
SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images
In the photo from House speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office, Mr. Barnett, alias Bigo, looks content as he sits at her desk. The staff resting on his leg has spike electrodes on it, and the Arkansas man bared them several times that day, prosecutors said. At one point, Mr. Barnett threatened to sic the mob on a police officer if the officer did not retrieve the flag Mr. Barnett left on Ms. Pelosi’s desk. Facing various weapons, obstruction and disorderly-conduct charges, he was convicted and sentenced to 54 months until Mr. Trump pardoned him.
Eric Munchel
Capitol insurrectionist, unaffiliated | Status: Pardoned
Win McNamee/Getty Images
The “zip-tie guy” and his mother, Lisa Eisenhart, stole some plastic restraints from a closet during the Jan. 6 insurrection, thinking they could be useful in holding senators hostage, according to the DOJ. The Tennessee man already had full tactical gear and a Taser. By the time they reached the Senate gallery, the politicians were gone. Both were convicted of felony obstruction charges and other offences. Mr. Munchel was sentenced to 57 months and Ms. Eisenhart to 30 months of prison time, with $2,000 each in restitution.
With reports from Alessandria Masi, Associated Press and Reuters