Trump-Appointed Judge Warns AGAINST Pardoning Capitol Rioters

US District Judge Carl Nichols, an appointee of Donald Trump, is warning against “blanket pardons” for people convicted of participating in the Capitol Riot. Nichols has overseen numerous Capitol Riot trials, and he’s seen first hand how these people behave and what motivated them to do what they did. If he can put aside his politics to warn against this then you know it is a bad idea. Ring of Fire’s Farron Cousins discusses this.

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*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.

As we all know, Donald Trump has, of course promised what, uh, I guess they're calling blanket pardons for anyone who participated in the Capitol Riot. That includes people who are currently awaiting trial, people who are currently on trial, people who are currently in jail, and people who have already gotten out of jail and anyone else that has not yet been identified and therefore not charged. But a lot of people don't think this is a good idea, including a Trump appointed judge who has overseen many trials of these capitol rioters. And that happens to be us District Judge Carl Nichols, who by the way, has come to save Donald Trump on multiple different occasions. But during a hearing this week, Nichols expressed his concern about Donald Trump issuing blanket pardons for the very people that he has had to send to prison. And unfortunately, he, he made this announcement as he was postponing the trial of a Capitol rioter because he knows Donald Trump is just going to pardon them.

So why should I bother going through with a trial? So he's postponing the trial, basically awaiting Donald Trump to pardon everybody. But here is what Nichols, uh, Nichols said, excuse me, blanket pardons for all January 6th defendants or anything close would be beyond frustrating and disappointing, but that's not my call he added. So I think that's about as strong of a statement as you're gonna get from the guy. Like, ah, it'd be frustrating and disappointing, but Nichols knows. And if Nichols a guy who is a hyper partisan, he is a MAGA guy, if he is willing to come out with even this mild criticism, then you know, this is a bad idea because it probably took a lot, it took all the courage that Judge had, which isn't much to make that statement. So to me, that carries a ton of weight. I don't want to give the guy too much credit because again, it was mild, but this is not a guy who speaks out.

This is a guy who follows orders and when he makes a statement like that, we need to listen. But there's a reason he made a statement like that. As I mentioned, he is overseeing numerous trials of these individuals. He has seen almost this psychosis that we have seen in some of these capitol rioters. He has seen the complete lack of remorse. He knows that these people given the opportunity, they'll do it again or they'll do something worse. He also knows, as the rest of us do that these people are already threatening to do worse. There have been multiple reports of that coming out as early as election night of these convicted

Capitol rioters, celebrating and of course threatening retribution. Something Donald Trump himself loves. Hell, even Elon Musk has suggested putting some of these people in the Department of Government efficiency. It's insane. But this is what they're gonna do. And again, kind of like Nichols said, not my call, it's not our call. There's literally nothing we can do to stop it. Nothing. Not a thing. And as usual, that's what is so frustrating about these plans from Donald Trump. The horrible things he wants to do, he can do without Congress. He can pardon these people day one. He has that authority. He can implement the tariffs, he can do the mass deportations, he can order the DOJ to go after his political enemies. And now that may not go anywhere. But those are things he has the ability to do. And that is what leads to the feelings of hopelessness that so much, uh, so many of us, I should say, are feeling right now. 'cause we know this is gonna happen and we know it's gonna be horrible, and all we can do is sit here and watch it happen.