A pro-Trump mob breaks into the U.S. Capitol on January 06, 2021. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)
December 25, 1868, and January 20, 2025, will now be forever linked in American history. These are the dates when two of our worst and most immoral Presidents, Andrew Johnson and Donald Trump, gave full pardons to traitors to the U.S. Constitution.
On that Christmas Day in 1868, President Johnson issued a proclamation declaring that all Confederate soldiers who fought in the conflict would “unconditionally, and without reservation, receive a full pardon and amnesty for the offence of treason against the United States, or of adhering to their enemies during the late Civil War, with restoration of all rights, privileges, and immunities under the Constitution and the laws.”
Johnson believed that white Southerners could prevent Black Americans from gaining political power during Reconstruction. We will never know what history would look like if Johnson had never given those pardons to the traitors of the Confederacy, but there is little doubt that the chances of Reconstruction succeeding would have been greater.
There is a reason why historians love to use the phrase, “Those who do not study history are doomed to repeat it.” Because here we are, almost 160 years later, living in our own disturbing historical moment. What Donald Trump did by granting full pardons to almost 1,600 convicted felons and insurrectionists is the most disgraceful act any President has committed in my lifetime.
While campaigning last year, he said he would grant pardons to the non-violent offenders, but the fact that he granted pardons to the violent cop beaters as well is a signal that his second term will be much more extreme than the first. Indeed, it’s clear that he is not going to even pretend that he gives a darn about the rule of law.
Even his own Vice President, JD Vance, said in an interview that “obviously people that committed violence against police officers that day should not get a pardon.” Vance knows that he supports a man without a moral compass, but Vance made a decision to put power over principles a long time ago and now he is tied to every awful act that Trump commits.
President Trump likes to rant and rave that other countries are releasing criminals from their prisons in order to send them to America. But now it is a fact that he is the one releasing violent criminals onto the streets.
The first time this occurred was in the aftermath of his disastrous deal with the Taliban to end the Afghanistan War in which he agreed to allow 5,000 Taliban fighters out of prison and received nothing of substance in return.
And now he has released 1,600 criminals back onto the streets of America who are loyal to him above all else. Few have displayed genuine remorse for their actions and there is a high probability many will commit crimes again. And if they do, Trump will have blood on his hands.
Trump has just made our country less safe for our children. He likes to say how these insurrectionists were just loving, kind people and patriots. The truth is that many of these people had prior criminal records for heinous acts like domestic abuse, strangulation, sexual abuse, assaulting police officers, and felony gun chargers.
Here in North Carolina, there is a January 6 defendant that received a full pardon from Trump who has also been charged in a separate case of child pornography and statutory rape of a 14-year-old girl. Do you think Trump cares at all about any of this? The answer is “no,” because these people worship him and tried to illegally help him hold onto power, and for that they are heroes and patriots to him.
Of course, the true patriots in this reality are the Capitol and DC Metropolitan police officers that bravely held the line that day. My heart breaks for them because all their blood, sweat, and tears that they shed that day in defense of our democracy seem to be for nothing in this moment. The person that instigated the insurrection has been reelected and the foot soldiers that violently attempted to carry out his mission have been set free. This is truly a shameful moment in American history.
In a recent interview, Officer Michael Fanone, who suffered a heart attack that day after being brutally tased in the neck with a stun gun, said that he feels betrayed by his country. He said that the rule of law no longer matters in America. And who could blame him for saying that?
America failed the moral test in the 2024 election, but now that we are here, we have two choices: We can either give up and let Donald Trump keep committing immoral acts and drag America’s values through the mud, or we can stand up and fight for what we believe in. I for one believe that we owe it to these brave men and women police officers that defended us all on January 6, 2021to right this wrong and help restore the rule of law and decency in this country that we love. We need to organize, mobilize, and use our voices to speak up against the injustices that we see. It will be a long fight ahead, but it is a worthy cause. I hope all citizens that still revere democracy, and the Constitution will join me.