Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), who headed Congress’s special investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, said Tuesday that he has been in talks with the White House about presidential pardons.
His comments confirmed a report, published hours earlier by Punchbowl News, that Thompson had at least one conversation in December with the White House counsel’s office about a potential pardon. He emphasized that he wasn’t lobbying for any special favors.
“It wasn’t preemptive,” Thompson said. “We had a discussion about pardons. It wasn’t a particular pardon. … I said for me, as a member of the committee, if one is offered, I would accept it.”
The issue of pardons has been under a spotlight because President-elect Trump has long accused the members of the Jan. 6 select committee of skewing their investigation to damage a political rival. Trump has suggested those investigators be punished, and he’s nominated several figures to top law enforcement offices who have supported the false claims that Joe Biden’s 2020 victory was rigged.
Pam Bondi, Trump’s nominee for U.S. attorney general, was a vocal supporter of the false claims that Trump had won Pennsylvania in the 2020 election, only to have it “stolen” by corrupt Democrats.
Kash Patel, Trump’s pick to lead the FBI, has accused that agency of orchestrating the Jan. 6 rampage and vowed to “find the conspirators” in the government and media who blamed Trump for the attack.
The combination has stirred fears that Trump’s Justice Department would seek criminal charges against the members of the Jan. 6 committee — and sparked talk that Biden should issue preemptive pardons for those lawmakers in the final week of his White House tenure.
Even so, Thompson’s talks with the administration appear to make him an outlier among members of the committee.
Several other Democrats who helped lead the special investigation into the Capitol rampage say they’ve had no contact with the White House on the issue.
“I’ve not been in touch with the White House. I’ve not sought one,” Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), a member of the Jan. 6 select committee, said Tuesday. “It’s up to the president to do what he thinks is right.”
Rep. Pete Aguilar (D-Calif.), another member of the panel, echoed that message, adding that a pardon is unnecessary given the nature of the panel’s investigation.
“[I] have not sought a pardon. [I] have not talked to anyone in the White House related to a pardon. I stand by the work that we did. We didn’t do anything wrong. I don’t think a pardon is necessary,” Aguilar, the chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, said during a press briefing in the Capitol.
“We committed to do a process together — to shine light on exactly what happened on Jan. 6, and the leadup, and the president’s role in thwarting a peaceful transfer of power,” Aguilar said. “That’s exactly what we did, and we stand by that work product.”
“I’m not aware of any conversations with the White House related to that.”
Other members of the committee, including former Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), who now serves in the U.S. Senate, have also said they don’t want a pardon out of concern that it would set a bad precedent that could be abused by future presidents.
“I don’t want to see each president hereafter on their way out the door giving out a broad category of pardons,” Schiff told CNN last week.
