U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., slammed President Donald Trump after the commander in chief suggested that pardons for him and other members of the House of Representatives January 6th Select Committee that investigated Trump are not legally enforceable after saying the pardons were signed by an autopen with former President Joe Biden’s signature.
“The “Pardons” that Sleepy Joe Biden gave to the Unselect Committee of Political Thugs, and many others, are hereby declared VOID, VACANT, AND OF NO FURTHER FORCE OR EFFECT,” Trump wrote on his social media platform Truth Social. The 47th president claimed, without evidence, that Biden “did not know anything” about the broad pardons he issued to Thompson, who served as chairman, and others part of the Jan. 6 committee that concluded Trump committed crimes in connection to the violent and deadly attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
He continued, “The necessary Pardoning Documents were not explained to, or approved by, Biden. He knew nothing about them, and the people that did may have committed a crime.”
When asked if the Trump administration had any evidence that President Biden was not aware that his signature was being used on “every single pardon,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said during Monday’s press briefing that reporters should ask the Biden White House. Leavitt also took a shot at Biden, calling the 82-year-old “cognitively impaired.” There is no public medical evidence to suggest Biden is cognitively impaired.
President Trump also suggested that as a result of his claims about Biden’s pardons being “void,” members of the congressional committee on Jan. 6 — who he said without evidence “destroyed and deleted ALL evidence” obtained by the committee — “should fully understand they are subject to investigation at the highest level.” Trump also suggested without evidence that the committee members themselves could have been “responsible” for the pardons being “signed on their behalf without the knowledge or consent of the Worst President in the History of our Country, Crooked Joe Biden!”
In a statement provided to theGrio, Congressman Thompson said plainly, “Donald Trump was responsible for the deadly January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol.” Referring to President Trump’s mass pardons of about 1,500 Jan. 6 rioters charged or convicted for the attack, the former committee chairman added, “That is why he raced to pardon those who beat the police who protected American democracy that day as one of his first official acts after returning to the White House.”
Thompson emphasized that the Jan. 6 committee was “bipartisan” (it included former Republican Reps. Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger) and that they “legally investigated what Trump and others did that terrible day.” Taking a dig at the president, Congressman Thompson said that he and the former members have “lived rent free in that criminal’s mind ever since.” He added, “Deep down he knows his own guilt. I am not afraid of Trump’s latest midnight rant that has no basis in reality.”
Harry Dunn, a former U.S. Capitol police officer who defended the Capitol building on Jan. 6, told theGrio during an interview after Trump’s pardoning of the rioters that America has to “stop pretending” that it is still a nation of “rule in law” when it “approves of having a president that wants to be a dictator.”
“We keep electing individuals that clearly don’t give a damn about the Constitution, democracy [and] decency,” said Dunn, who resigned from the Capitol police force for an unsuccessful run for Congress during the 2024 election. “The only way we can stop that, is the people. But the people kind of failed us in November.”
