Trump will pardon the Oath Keepers — and other 'enemies of the constitutional order': J6 committee member
On CNN Tuesday, House January 6 Committee member Jamie Raskin (D-MD) weighed in on the conviction of Oath Keepers leadership for seditious conspiracy, following the far-right paramilitary group's involvement in the attack on the U.S. Capitol.
The whole affair, he argued, is yet another reminder of the danger the country faces should former President Donald Trump be elected to a second term in 2024.
"What verdict should be sent to former President Trump, and also to political allies in Congress? Some of which you served in in the house which have downplayed this?" asked anchor Brianna Keilar.
"Donald Trump has repeatedly dangled the likelihood that if he were ever to return to the Oval Office by any means, that he would provide pardons," said Raskin. "He would pardon the January 6th defendants. Of course, his political subculture now treats the January 6 defendants as political prisoners, rather than people who beat our police officers over the head with Confederate battle flags and Trump flags, and destroyed federal property, and drove the House and the Senate out of their chambers, and a mob action by domestic violence for the first time in American history. These people have proven themselves to be enemies of the constitutional order, and so I don't know that Donald Trump will be moved to do anything other than to return to his idea of offering pardons to people who were guilty of committing crimes during the course of events that he set into motion himself."
"A former Oath Keepers spokesperson says he worries that Trump would try to whip up a civil war by using lies and deceit," said Keilar. "There are many people out there who are sympathetic to these defendants to think this was — and folks have said publicly they think this was all sort of in the bag for the government. They believe the DOJ is corrupt and not convinced by these verdicts. I wonder if you think the verdicts are a deterrent to sympathizers, or if you think it might make a murderer of the defendants as well."
"I certainly hope it will work as a deterrent to people who were considering trying to overthrow the government of the United States, and to get a president to use violence and subversion of the constitutional order to him pose martial law and to oust the democratic Constitution that we have got," said Raskin. "But, I think your point is correct. We have to remember that Donald Trump and the forces of chaos and vendetta and authoritarianism are still very much out there."
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