WASHINGTON — Five years after he and his allies tried and failed to overturn the results of the 2020 election, President Donald Trump is using his time back in the White House to take a series of actions aimed at erasing or rewriting the Jan. 6, 2021, siege on the U.S. Capitol, with more likely to come.
Trump mass pardoned Jan. 6 rioters on his first day back in office. Justice Department officials and FBI agents involved in the massive investigation and prosecution were fired. Dozens of other supporters involved in efforts to overturn the election results have been pre-emptively pardoned.
A former Jan. 6 prosecutor said Trump’s actions — and the growing embrace of them by a broader swath of Americans — were “maddening.”
“I spoke with dozens and dozens of people who were there that day and who are still dealing with the trauma,” said the prosecutor, who was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity. “It makes you feel crazy because you know what happened that day, but there is the chief executive nodding positively along to this narrative that they are trying to build.”
At least 140 law enforcement officers were injured and millions of dollars in damage was done to the Capitol in 2021 as thousands of pro-Trump rioters shattered windows and broke through the doors in a failed effort to stop the counting of electoral votes to certify Joe Biden’s win.
On the anniversary Tuesday, as pro-Trump demonstrators gathered near the Capitol, the White House launched a page on its official website dedicated to Trump’s narrative, claiming that the protesters were peaceful in 2021 and that it was the police response that escalated tensions. A timeline reads: “Stolen Election Certified,” and it restates claims that former Vice President Mike Pence was trying to sabotage Trump when he refused to stop the certification of electoral votes.
On X, Pence said that it was a "tragic day" but that it “became a triumph of freedom when, after Capitol Police quelled the violence, leaders in both chambers in both political parties reconvened the very same day and finished democracy’s work under the Constitution.”
White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said Monday that it was the media that was still focused on the Capitol siege.
“The media’s continued obsession with January 6 is one of the many reasons trust in the press is at historic lows — they aren’t covering issues that the American people actually care about,” she said in a statement. “President Trump was resoundingly reelected to enact an agenda based on securing the border, driving down crime, and restarting our economy — the president is delivering.”
A federally funded compensation fund for Jan. 6 rioters is under discussion, Trump has said, “because a lot of the people in government really like that group of people.”
His administration has already paid nearly $5 million to the family of Ashli Babbitt, who was carrying a knife and was killed trying to jump through a broken window to the House Speaker’s Lobby.
Barry Silbermann, an attorney who represents some Jan. 6 defendants, said he has been in communication with the Justice Department about his clients’ claims under the Federal Tort Claims Act.
“President Trump has expressed willingness, but that has to translate into allocation of funds,” Silbermann said. “They had their lives unilaterally destroyed unfairly by a deep state within the Department of Justice that needs to be rectified.”
Some Republican senators are similarly threatening to sue the federal government for compensation after having learned their phone records were seized as part of special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
And Trump has said he is seeking “a lot of money” from the federal government because of Smith’s investigation.
“I was damaged very greatly, and any money that I would get I would give to charity,” he said.
In the months after the attack, Americans generally agreed on what had just happened; Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, called it a “terrorist attack.”
But that sentiment, especially among Republicans, has shifted over the years as Trump regained political power while continuing to claim the 2020 election had been stolen. By the time of the first anniversary of Jan. 6, Cruz said his remark had been “frankly dumb.”
