DeSantis Says He’ll Consider Pardoning Trump AND Jan. 6 Defendants as President
Florida governor and 2024 GOP presidential candidate Ron DeSantis (R) told conservative radio hosts Clay Travis and Buck Sexton on Thursday he would consider pardoning Jan. 6th rioters and former President Donald Trump if elected.
“I’m sure you agree. You have a law background. You’ve obviously been very aggressive legally in what you can and cannot do as a governor of Florida. Department of Justice, the FBI has gone after the January 6th defendants with reckless, I would say, abandon. A big part of being president is pardon powers. Do you think the January 6th defendants deserve to have their cases examined by a Republican president?” DeSantis was asked on the show.
“And if Trump, let’s say, gets charged with federal offenses and you are the president of the United States, would you look at potentially pardoning Trump himself based on the evidence that might emerge of those charges?” the newly announced presidential candidate was pressed.
DeSantis replied, “The DOJ and FBI have been weaponized. We see that. We see it in a variety of contexts, some of which you mentioned. Some of it is the FBI going after parents, going to school, board meetings.”
“Some of it’s how they treat a pro-life demonstrator, how they don’t go after people that are attacking pro-lifers and so what I’m going to do is I’m going to do on day one, I will have folks that will get together and look at all these cases, who people are victims of weaponization or political targeting, and we will be aggressive in issuing pardons,” DeSantis promised, adding:
Now, some of these cases, some people may have a technical violation of the law, but if there are three other people who did the same thing, but just in a context like BLM and they don’t get prosecuted at all, that is uneven application of justice. And so we’re going to find ways where that did not happen. And then we will use the pardon power, and I will do that at the front end. You know, a lot of people wait until the end of the administration to issue pardons. We’re going to find examples where government’s been weaponized against disfavored groups and we will apply relief as appropriate.
But it will be done on a case-by-case basis, because I think you’ve got to make sure that there’s a whole bunch of cases that don’t necessarily get headlines. But if people are being treated just because they don’t get on TV or something, they’re being treated disfavorably. They need to have a fair hearing as well.
“And that could be from a grandma who got arrested and prosecuted too much all the way up to potentially Trump himself. Is that fair to say when you analyze what the charges might have been brought on a federal level?” DeSantis was pressed, as the host again mentioned Trump directly.
“I would say any example of disfavored treatment based on politics or weaponization would be included in that review, no matter how small or how big,” DeSantis replied without mentioning Trump by name, but making clear he would consider pardoning the former president.
Trump has vowed to pardon Jan. 6th defendants dating back to January of 2022 when he told a Texas rally, “So many people have been asking me about it.”
“If I run and I win, we will treat those people from January 6th fairly. We will treat them fairly. And if it requires pardons, we will give them pardons because they are being treated so unfairly,” Trump added as the crowd cheered.
Listen to the full clip above.
