‘We are packing up’: January 6 prisoners are preparing for Trump’s amnesty | Donald Trump news

Washington, DC – The vibration from the prison window was met with cheers from the small crowd waiting outside.

At DC’s Central Detention Center, the alarm has become an almost nightly tradition. As the sunlight begins to fade, the prisoners inside try to flicker the lights as a signal to their supporters.

But the gesture sparked a special cheer among the roughly two dozen people who gathered on the sidewalk Sunday, despite the freezing temperatures.

It was the night before the fourth anniversary of January 6, 2021, when thousands stormed the US Capitol. unusual attempt To overturn Donald Trump’s defeat in the 2020 election.

Over the past nearly 900 days, a small group has gathered to show support for those convicted of the riot, some of whom are being held in the D.C. detention center.

Still, insiders were in high spirits, due in large part to Trump’s victory in the November election. It was an unprecedented reversal of political fortunes that saw the president-elect bounce back from defeat in 2020.

His second term will start in just two weeks. As part of his agenda, Trump has promised to pardon those convicted of the attack on the Capitol four years ago.

“The energy here today was absolutely incredible,” Dominique Box, who is charged with breaking and entering and disorderly conduct, said by phone from jail.

His words were broadcast by supporters outside, who connected their mobile phones to microphones.

Box expressed his hope for Trump’s upcoming inauguration. “We expect these pardons to come down by the end of the week,” he said.

“Many of the men, including me, started packing our things,” she said. “Each of us will walk out of these doors for the last time.”

At least 1583 people According to the information of the US Department of Justice, charges were brought in connection with the events of January 6, 2021.

About 608 of them were charged with assaulting, resisting or obstructing law enforcement officers. That includes 174 people charged with assault with a deadly weapon.

“Political hostages” or rebellion?

In many ways, pardoning convicted persons On January 6, it would be the biggest achievement for Trump.

The Republican leader has long claimed, without evidence, that the 2020 election was “stolen” from him through widespread voter fraud.

Trump also faced legal threats for his role in the January 6 attack on the US Capitol.

In a federal case in Georgia and Washington, D.C., he was accused of leading a conspiracy to overturn the 2020 election. The DC case has since been dismissed in light of his re-election.

But Trump dismissed the criminal charges as a “political witch hunt.” Drawing an analogy to his own situation, he called the sentences given to defendants on Jan. 6 unfair, particularly to nonviolent offenders.

He called those defendants “political prisoners” and “hostages” at different times, and said that he would start considering their cases in the “first hour” of the second term of his administration.

Trump’s statements underscore the divergent narratives that emerged on January 6.

Trump supporters dismissed the riots as a simple protest, while Democrats emphasized the severity of the attack, which came as lawmakers tried to approve the 2020 ballot.

On Sunday, US President Joe Biden once again called the January 6 attack “a real threat to democracy.”

In a column of “The Washington Post” newspaper, Biden condemned Trump’s attempts to describe the attack on the US Capitol as an act of patriotism.

“There was a relentless effort to rewrite, even erase, the history of that day,” Biden wrote. “Explaining it as an out-of-control protest. That’s not what happened.”

Some right-wing politicians and institutions have also condemned attempts to play down the January 6 attack.

For example, the Rule of Law Society, founded by conservative lawyers and judges, argued that the extraordinary nature of the attack on the US Capitol called for a harsher punishment.

“(Trump’s) statements promising to pardon the rioters make a mockery of the rule of law, and we condemn them in the strongest terms,” ​​the group said.

‘Hopefully he’ll let me go’

But for the protesters who gathered outside the D.C. detention center, there was little question that the charges were fraught with injustice.

Many accused law enforcement agencies of entrapping the January 6 rioters. Some also argued that the violent actions of a few were used to smear everyone present.

The authorities have done this many times denied those claims.

In the released phone call, Box repeated the oft-repeated claim that no Capitol Police officers died as a direct result of the attack.

However, the Capitol Police claimed five deaths were related to the riot: One officer, Brian Sicknick, was attacked and died a day after suffering two strokes, and four others died by suicide in the following months.

Nevertheless, Box described his actions on January 6 as an act of free speech protected by the First Amendment of the US Constitution.

“Not one of the January 6th defendants, whether in prison, on the FBI list, or released today, has done nothing but engage in First Amendment-protected activities, address our grievances, and let the world hear our concerns about what’s sure to be. Stolen election in 2020,” Box said.

Brandon Fellows, 30, was also charged in the Jan. 6 incidents. He served nearly three years in a D.C. jail after prosecutors proved he entered the U.S. Capitol through a broken window and smoked marijuana in Sen. Jeff Merkley’s office.

Later, he was accused of making noise during court proceedings.

But Fellows was released on probation, which restricts him to an 80 km (50 mi) radius around Washington. He attended a protest outside the DC detention center on Sunday wearing a Make America Great Again hat, a sign of his continued support for Trump.

“Hopefully (Trump) fires me so I can leave and start my life,” Fellows said, adding that he wants to restart the lumber and chimney business he ran before his arrests.

“Donald Trump’s term of office has been extended”

The curfews were first started by Micki Witthoeft, the mother of Ashley Babbitt, the woman killed by Capitol Police on Jan. 6 when she tried to climb through a broken window.

Nicole Reffitt has been one of the main organizers ever since. Her husband, Guy Reffitt, was the first defendant to be sentenced on January 6, 2022. After that, he moved from Texas to Washington, D.C. to assist other defendants in the trial.

“When the United States government has sheer power over you or someone you love, it’s a very scary feeling and it’s very intimidating,” he told Al Jazeera.

Guy Reffitt was found guilty of inciting a civil disturbance, obstructing official proceedings and being in a restricted building with a firearm.

A Jan. 6 video shows Reffitt, a member of the Texas Three Percent militia, saying, “I just want to see (Pat. Speaker Nancy) Pelosi’s head hit every single staircase on the way out.” He was sentenced to almost seven years in prison.

Nicole Reffitt, who is hoping to get a reprieve from Trump, says politics distorted justice in her husband’s case.

He and protesters have created an “Advent Calendar” to mark the days leading up to Trump’s January 20 inauguration.

“I saw half-truths and exaggerations used as fact of the law and a DC grand jury that saw my wife as a follower of Donald Trump,” Reffitt said. “Justice in America is not supposed to be played this way.”