Former Illinois Republican congressman Adam Kinzinger appeared on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert on Monday evening and declared that he would be willing to go to prison on principle if Donald Trump chooses to persecute him once he returns to the White House.
Kinzinger – who along with Liz Cheney served on the bipartisan House committee that investigated the events of January 6 2021, earning them the lasting enmity of the MAGA wing of the Republican Party – was guesting on the fourth anniversary of the Capitol riot as the president-elect’s November election win over Democrat Kamala Harris was certified by Congress.
Asked by the host why he had told Anderson Cooper on CNN that he would refuse any presidential pardon extended to him by Joe Biden as a protective measure in advance of Trump’s return to the Oval Office, Kinzinger answered simply: “Because I didn’t do anything wrong.”
The blunt statement drew a huge round of applause from the studio audience after which the former representative elaborated: “If Donald Trump wants to come after me… Look, do I want him to come after me? Of course not.
“But if he decides to, I’ll be twice as much of a pain in his backside because I will, from my cell in jail, continue to remind the American people that this is not the country we live in, this was not the country the Constitution represents, and I will continue to call him out.
“So if that’s what my next thing of service is, is doing it from a jail cell, OK.”
That answer also drew an admiring reaction before Colbert punctured the tension by joking: “Can I have your pardon?”
Elsewhere in their interview, Kinzinger identified former House speaker Kevin McCarthy’s early visit to Trump at Mar-a-Lago, just three weeks after the attack on the legislative complex, as a pivotal moment for their party, which ultimately led to its decision to stick with the billionaire property tycoon and his loyal MAGA following.
On the prospect of Trump’s new administration, he said that he was most concerned by what would happen to American support for Ukraine in its ongoing war with Russia and warned that the “guardrails of the law” could come under attack, outlining how the “weaponization” of the Justice Department or a Kash Patel-led FBI could see the launch of nuisance investigations leading nowhere that nevertheless leave their subjects bankrupt and discredited unfairly.
Kinzinger also cited Pete Hegseth and Tulsi Gabbard as two more Trump nominees he was concerned about and, more surprisingly, revealed that his passion for director Steve Pink’s comedy movie Hot Tub Time Machine (2010) was the reason he chose to work with him on their new documentary The Last Republican, detailing the ex-congressman’s patriotic stand against Trumpism.
Kinzinger otherwise spent the anniversary of January 6 trolling his conservative former colleagues on social media by highlighting how they had changed their tune regarding the events of that infamous day as soon as it became politically-expedient for them to do so.
In his opening monologue, Colbert had reflected on the contrast between the day’s events on Capitol Hill and the violence and anarchy of four years earlier.
“The striking thing about this time was how normal it was,” the comedian observed.
“There was no riot, no one broke a window with their beard.
“In fact, the whole process took only 30 minutes… Democracy shouldn’t take longer than it takes Rachel Ray to make a meal.”
