Conservatives lined up to take photos with recently pardoned January 6 convicts at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) on Thursday.
For years, supporters of the people arrested for storming the U.S. Capitol in an attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election results for President Donald Trump had found a supportive space at CPAC. Last year, as the conference kicked off in Oxon Hill, Maryland just outside Washington, D.C., attendees shouted “free J6.”
Now, after Trump pardoned them, they received rockstar treatment throughout the conference. Stewart Rhodes, the founder of the far-right Oath Keepers who went to prison for his actions, walked around the conference as a free man after his sentence was commuted. Enrique Tarrio, the former head of the Proud Boys, regaled attendees.
Gabriel Garcia said when he heard the news in his home in Miami, Florida, he cut off his ankle monitor, which prompted a police officer to ask him what happened.
“They asked me. ‘Who gave you permission,’ I said ‘some guy named Donald J. Trump,’” he told The Independent. Garcia was a member of the Miami chapter of the Proud Boys. He had been charged with obstruction of law enforcement. In December, Judge Amy Berman Jackson sentenced him to 12 months in prison and 24 months of house arrest along with a $2,000 fine for restitution.
Garcia, covered in tattoos, wore an orange shirt saying “Political Prisoner” in bold letters with a prisoner number.
Trump pledged as early as 2022 that he would pardon January 6 rioters. During some of his rallies, he played a version of the “Star Spangled Banner” sung by inmates that also featured Trump reciting the Pledge of Allegiance.
Steve Bannon, Trump’s longtime adviser, heralded their presence.
“All of them are here,” he said to applause from the stage. Bannon suggested that the J6 Choir perform at the Kennedy Center after Trump took over the performing arts venue earlier this month.
And on his first day in office, Trump granted a full pardon to all rioters.
“Promises made, promises kept,” Garcia said. “He did exactly what he was going to do and I applaud him for it.”
The annual conservative gathering has always been a source of support for Trump, given he gave his first major political speech there in 2011 that began his road to the presidency.
His first major appearance after the January 6 riot came at CPAC in 2021 in his adopted home state Florida, signalling he would no longer be a pariah.
But this time, right-wingers at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center had an undeniable feeling that they had triumphed.
Many of the people pardoned seemed grateful for Trump pardoning them. Gina Bisignano said she wanted to extend her stay to see Trump speak on Saturday.
“I have to see President Trump,” she told Garcia. She said she did not feel any contrition for her actions.
Trump’s pardon came despite the fact that Vice President JD Vance had said that the president would not pardon people who assaulted police officers.
But Trump did, much to the chagrin of some Senate Republicans. Barry Ramey was sentenced in 2023 for assaulting, resisting and impeding officers.
“But the story that doesn’t get told is the 30-40 minutes leading up to that event where we were fired upon with rubber bullets,” he told The Independent. Ramey said that it had still not fully hit home that he had been pardoned.
“I’m not justifying my actions, but they did occur,” he said.
But Bisignano told The Independent: “I believe we all had a reason to do what we did. They inequivocally stole our election, as we know? Right? So I knew that the injustice was not going to be carried on. As soon as he ran and he was on Joe Rogan, yeah, that’s it. I knew it. We won.”
Suzanne Monk, who founded the J6 Pardon Project, told The Independent she was pleased with the pardons.
“These J6ers are some of the strongest people in the world and the most dedicated Americans you’ve ever met, and they are going to do amazing things,” she said. “And we are going to see a rectification of our prison system and a rectification of our Department of Justice, so that it’s fair and equal for all of us because of the work that these January 6ers are going to come out and do.”
Throughout the conference, people said they wanted those who convicted people who took part in the riot to face some kind of accountability.
“In the January 6 investigations, they spent billions of dollars to to literally surveil people for misdemeanors,” she told The Independent. In recent months, the Justice Department has forced out senior FBI officials and requested the names of officials who participated in the riot.
Just as the conference carried onto the afternoon, the crowd erupted when the Senate voted to confirm Kash Patel, a longtime Trump loyalist, to lead the FBI.
