Pardons upend massive Jan. 6 prosecution

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

68% : "I do think it showed a lot of courage by President Trump to pardon everybody, so we are obviously grateful for that.
45% : He said he was going to have the pardon from Trump framed.John Pierce, an attorney who represented several Jan. 6 defendants, said he was "pleasantly surprised" that Trump's pardons went as far as they did, considering Vice President JD Vance's recent comments that suggested only nonviolent offenders would receive relief.
33% : "Trump will go to great lengths to protect those who act in his name.
33% : The motions were marked with the name of the man Trump has named to lead, at least temporarily, the capital's U.S. Attorney's Office -- Ed Martin, a board member of a group called the Patriot Freedom Project, which portrays the Jan. 6 defendants as victims of political persecution.
30% : It also shows how Trump plans to radically overhaul the Justice Department that also brought criminal charges against him in two cases he contends were politically motivated.
28% : The former leaders of the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys, who were convicted of seditious conspiracy in the most serious charges brought by the Justice Department, were released from prison hours after Trump signed the clemency order.
23% : Trump's decision to grant clemency to even rioters who assaulted police -- whom his own vice president recently said "obviously" shouldn't be pardoned -- underscores how Trump returned to power emboldened to take actions once believed politically unthinkable.

*Our bias meter rating uses data science including sentiment analysis, machine learning and our proprietary algorithm for determining biases in news articles. Bias scores are on a scale of -100% to 100% with higher negative scores being more liberal and higher positive scores being more conservative, and 0% being neutral. The rating is an independent analysis and is not affiliated nor sponsored by the news source or any other organization.