President Donald Trump is facing criticism after suggesting the creation of a "compensation fund" for individuals who were pardoned after participating in the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.
In one of his first official actions upon returning to office, Trump granted sweeping clemency to nearly 1,600 people charged in connection with the riot. He issued pardons to most defendants and commuted the sentences of 14 members of the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers militia, many of whom had been convicted of seditious conspiracy.
Trump has previously described the rioters as “hostages” and victims of an unfair legal system. Despite the violent nature of the attack—including assaults on police officers, property destruction, and threats against Vice President Mike Pence—he has continued to portray the events as largely peaceful protests.
During an interview with Newsmax host Greg Kelly on Tuesday night, Trump—who is also forever obsessed with crowd size—stated that he had “taken care” of his supporters involved in the attack and mentioned that discussions were underway about compensating them.
He said:
"I took care of them. I said I was going to and I did. ... There's a lot of talk about [compensation]. We have a lot of people talking about it, a lot of the people now in government talk about it because a lot of the people in government really like that group of people."
"They were patriots as far as I'm concerned. I talk about them a lot. They were treated very unfairly."
"The thing they [the media] show is they show a group of 1,000, whatever they may be, 1,500 people. What they don't show is you never see the crowd that day. It was the biggest crowd I've spoken before. It went all the way to the Washington monument."
"It was so wide. You virtually couldn't see anything else anything else but people. They never show that whether it's a million people or less than a million. I don't know what it was but I see they say Bernie Sanders has a few people out there. A group of people went down there peacefully and patriotically, remember that."
You can hear what he said in the video below.
Some of the pardoned January 6 rioters and their supporters, including Ed Martin—whom Trump appointed as the top federal prosecutor in Washington—have been advocating for financial compensation for those involved in the attack.
Many of these individuals spent time in prison, and their advocates argue they deserve reparations for what they see as unjust treatment by the legal system.
But these calls conveniently overlook that the attack, spurred by Trump's lie that he defeated then-candidate Joe Biden in the 2020 election, resulted in at least five deaths, over 100 injuries to law enforcement—some of whom were forced to retire or resign due to PTSD—and millions of dollars in property damage to the Capitol building.
The notion that participants in the attack could end up benefiting financially on top of being pardoned sparked considerable outrage among those who noted that such a move would incentivize domestic terrorism.
Trump later called himself a “big fan” of Ashli Babbitt, who was fatally shot by a Capitol police officer as she attempted to climb through a broken window into the Speaker’s Lobby.
“Ashli Babbitt was a really good person who was a big MAGA fan, Trump fan,” he said, claiming she was “innocently standing there” and even “trying to sort of hold back the crowd.” He described the officer’s actions as “unthinkable” when he “shot her.”
When asked if he would take action against the officer, Trump said he would “take a look at it.” U.S. Capitol Police Lt. Michael Byrd was investigated by the Justice Department and cleared of any wrongdoing in the shooting.
