It has been nearly five years since Donald Trump incited a violent insurrection against the United States, exhorting his MAGA cult followers to storm the Capitol in order to undermine democracy and retain his authoritarian grip on power. On that day the lives of members of Congress were threatened, 140 police officers were hospitalized, and Trump watched it all on TV for three hours before doing anything to end it.

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On the first day of his reoccupation of the White House this year, Trump issued a blanket pardon for the rioters, many of whom had already pleaded guilty and been convicted of crimes as serious as seditious conspiracy. It was a brazenly treasonous act of betrayal to the country and the principles of law and order. Not that Trump cares about any of that unless he can use it to target his political foes.

SEE THIS: Trump Accuses Democratic Members of Congress With ‘Seditious Behavior, Punishable by Death’

Last week Trump’s “Justice” Department announced that they had arrested Brian J. Cole, Jr., as a suspect in the long lingering case of the D.C. pipe bomber, who planted bombs at the offices of the Democratic and Republican parties. While the motives are still not confirmed, it was revealed that he told investigators that he believed Trump’s “Big Lie” that the 2020 election was rigged and stolen from him. Which would make him another violence-prone, right-wing wacko.

However, the plot thickens as legal analysts speculate that Cole might be able to claim that he can’t be charged because Trump’s January 6th pardons apply to him. They reason that the language of pardon was written so vaguely that it could include a broad array of people that were merely in the vicinity. It reads that Trump was granting…

“…a full, complete and unconditional pardon to all other individuals convicted of offenses related to events that occurred at or near the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021, [and] pursue dismissal with prejudice to the government of all pending indictments.”

Legal analysts worried that at the time the pardon was issued the ambiguity in that language could cause problems. But Trump’s legal advisors were too incompetent to pay heed to the warnings. This potential loophole was discussed on Fox News Friday by panelists on the “The Five” when Gillian Turner raised the question of whether Trump’s pardons could apply to Cole. Her co-panelist Emily Compagno replied…

“If that’s true, then this Justice Department will find a way to charge him with something, because they will not let this guy get away with it. And that’s the difference between this administration and the prior administration. Yes, pardons are absolute, but unlike Biden, that says for everything that will be ever done, that was specific by president Trump.”

Emily Compango on Fox News – It's okay to grant pardons for people who beat cops and were convicted of seditious conspiracy for their role on Jan. 6th. But the DOJ will make sure the Trump supporter who planted pipe bombs is charged with a crime. But Biden's pardons were bad ????

— Decoding Fox News (@decodingfoxnews.bsky.social) 2025-12-06T16:43:12.192Z

There is a lot wrong with that answer. First of all, Compagno is suggesting that it would be proper for the the DoJ to try on various charges until they find one that they think will fit. But more to the point, she doesn’t deny the slippery slope that Trump created by issuing such a fuzzy pardon in the first place. Then she follows that up by making a lame attempt at “bothsides-ing” the matter to blame Biden for issuing vague pardons when his were actually well written and narrowly detailed in their scope.

Furthermore, no one would be surprised if Trump intended for his pardons to be broadly interpreted in order to grant all of his accomplices a “get out of jail free” card. And the DC pipe bomber is just the sort of person that Trump would want to set free. He is a Trump supporter. And that’s all that Trump cares about. It’s why he has already given pardons to so many other scurrilous cretins. Including one just last week to the former president of Honduras who was convicted of trafficking 500 tons of cocaine into the U.S.

Trump has even done this before. A set of pardons that Trump previously issued for his co-conspirators in the “fake electors” scheme had the same imprecision as the January 6th pardons. He listed 77 people (i.e. Rudolph Giuliani, Jeffrey Clark, John Eastman, Jenna Ellis, Sidney Powell, Mark Meadows, etc.), but added that the list was not limited to them. That pardon reads that Trump grants…

“…a full, complete, and unconditional pardon to all United States citizens for conduct relating to the advice, creation, organization, execution, submission, support, voting, activities, participation in, or advocacy for or of any slate or proposed slate of Presidential electors…”

There is already someone using that pardon as a defense in a case wherein he is accused of voting twice in two different states. Obviously that has nothing to do with the intent of the pardon, but it was written so poorly that this argument can still be made. In fact, anyone who committed voter fraud in 2020 could try to claim that it applies to them.

Time will tell if this defense strategy will work. But just giving people like the DC pipe bomber openings like this is evidence that Trump’s ignorance, incompetence, and perhaps deliberate intentions, is not making America safer for anyone but the criminals in Trump’s MAGA mob family.

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