FBI Chief Wray Demolishes Pro-Trump Rioters When Asked About January 6 Pardons In 60 Minutes Interview
Outgoing FBI Director Christopher Wray thoroughly trashed January 6 rioters when CBS News anchor Scott Pelley asked him about President-elect Donald Trump’s promise to pardon many convicted defendants.
There’s been a lot of chatter about whether Trump will pardon violent offenders — but Trump himself refused to rule out such a move. Trump held a press conference at his Mar-a-Lago resort Tuesday during which he was asked about his plan to pardon January 6 rioters, including one reporter who asked, “Will you pardon anyone who attacked a police officer?”
Trump responded with a lengthy series of digressions that included bizarre and false claims but did not include ruling out pardoning offenders who injured police with violence.
Wray sat for an exit interview that aired on Sunday night’s edition of CBS News’s 60 Minutes, during which Pelley pressed him on issues like the raid on Mar-a-lago and the threat of retribution from the incoming Trump administration.
Pelley also asked about President Joe Biden’s anger at the treatment of his son Hunter Biden — who was the recipient of a preemptive pardon:
Scott Pelley (Voice-Over): Wray’s FBI also investigated President Biden for keeping classified documents, and separately, investigated Biden’s son, Hunter, who was convicted on gun and tax charges. Biden pardoned his son last month calling the investigation “raw politics.”
Scott Pelley: But you’re being criticized by a Democratic president and a Republican president. What does that tell you?
Christopher Wray: This is a hard job. You’re inevitably going to make different people angry, often very powerful people. But part of the essence of the rule of law is to make sure that facts, and the law, and proper predication drive investigations, not who’s in power, not who wants it to be so or not so.
And Wray pulled no punches when asked about the prospect of Trump pardons, ticking off a damning set of facts:
Scott Pelley (Voice-Over): Christopher Wray oversaw the largest case in FBI history—the attack on the Capitol in 2021. President-elect Trump has vowed to pardon many of the 1,500 people who were charged.
Christopher Wray: I do think it’s important to step back and remember that we’re talking about hundreds of people who are convicted, most of them pled guilty of serious federal crimes. Heck, I think a 170 or so of them pled guilty to assaulting law enforcement, dozens of them with dangerous or deadly weapons. And there’s a whole bunch that were convicted of seditious conspiracy. We had a case in Tennessee just– a couple months ago where a jury convicted a January 6 defendant who had actually doubled down on his crimes by putting together a kill list to murder FBI agents. Now where I come from, violence against law enforcement, threats against law enforcement is serious business and totally unacceptable.
Watch above via CBS News’s 60 Minutes.
