More that 1500 people were pardoned by US President Donald Trump in his first hours in the job, having been convicted on charges for their role in storming the Capitol during the January 6 insurection.
Almost every person who participated was pardoned, including those who were violent, had destroyed property and even injured police officers — with around 140 police officers assaulted during the riot.
The overwhelming majority of those pardoned were men, due to the fact the overwhelming majority of those who participated were men, with 86 per cent of those arrested male.
But at least one woman who was pardoned has rejected the move, accepting responsibility for her actions and expressing dismay for how the events of Jan 6 are being rewritten.
Her name is Pamela Hemphill, now 71, she was once nicknamed, “the MAGA Granny”.
“The J6 criminals are trying to rewrite history by saying that it was not a riot; t wasn’t an insurrection. I don’t want to be part of their trying to rewrite what happened that day,” she told the Idaho Statesman, a key news outlet in the state where she lives.
“Accepting the pardon would be an insult to the Capitol Police officers, to the rule of law, to our nation.”
“The pardon is a slap in their face,” she said of the 140 police officers who were injured during the attack. “It’s like the country let them down. They were the heroes that day.”
She said she’ll be filing a letter of rection through her lawyer — which has happened before, in 1833 when a another person who received a presidential pardon was able to officially turn it down.
Hemphill pleaded guilty to one misdemeanor count of parading, demonstrating or picketing in the Capital building in 2022 and was sentenced to 60 days in jail, three years probation and a $500 fine.
She had travelled to Washington in January 2021 having only recently undergone surgery to remove cancerous breast tissue. She still had the stitchers as she participated int he riot.
She said she went at the suggestion of her brother, who noted that she would soon be starting chemotherapy and it would likely be Trump’s last event.
She described talking with a group of Proud Boys following Trump’s “March to Save America” rally and then following them to the Capitol.
She streamed much of what she saw during the riot, and could later be seen on surveillance footage walking through the Capitol Rotunda. At one point, she shared a video where she was telling a man of how violent the situation had become, noting that people had “walked over her”. Speaking this week, Hemphill told the Idaho Statesman she recalled how people “stepped on me, threw me down, cut my knee, broke my glasses, stepped on my head, pulled out my shoulder.”
She said that it was ultimately the police officers who had pulled her up.
Hemphill added that she as removed herself from what she described as “a cult” and has changed her opinions about Trump and what occurred that day.
She had become interested in politics after she retired from work as a drug and alcohol counselor in 2011 as a means for finding more direction and purpose in life. She’d spend decades in such work, having recovered herself from addiction 45 years ago.
Hemphill is attracting national and international media for her move and for taking a courageous stand for the remorse she feels.
She’s calling out the misinformation she’s seeing online, and how the events of that day are being reshaped.
It’s a powerful new purpose for a woman who clearly has long aimed to help others. It’s the power of reflection, of rejecting lies and of having the courage to admit you’ve changed your view on something, despite having been so deeply engaged in it.
She told the BBC, ‘we were wrong that day”.
“I pleaded guilty because I was guilty, and accepting a pardon also would serve to contribute to their gaslighting and false narrative.”
She told The New York Times that she “lost of my critical thinking” in getting involved and that “Now I now it was a cult, and I was in a cult”.
In 2023, Hemphill told CNN about how seeing Trump sharing a false social media post about her inspired her to respond to the president to “not use me for anything” and that she is was not a victim.
She also spoke about how she believed the Capitol Police had saved her life that day, and how deeply grateful she was to them.
Jacob Chansley had a different reaction to being pardoned. The self styled QAnon Shaman, who people might remember as the guy who entered the building shirtless nd wearing a horned helmet, was released from jail in 2023 having served 27 months of his 41 month sentence.
“I walked outside and I screamed ‘freedom’ at the top of my lungs and then gave a good Native American war cry,” he said.
He wrote on X, “NOW I AM GONNA BUY SOME MOTHA FU*KIN GUNS!!! I LOVE THIS COUNTRY!!! GOD BLESS AMERICA!!!!”
The post The 71yo woman who stormed the Capitol and rejects Trump’s pardon appeared first on Women's Agenda.
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