Bondi Fires Three Jan. 6 Prosecutors

Attorney General Pam Bondi on Friday terminated at least three prosecutors involved in Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot cases, according to multiple reports.

The Trump administration has pardoned all Jan. 6 protesters and has taken actions against those who prosecuted them for a variety of allegations connected to the unrest.

Among those dismissed were two attorneys who supervised the Jan. 6 prosecutions in Washington and a line attorney who prosecuted cases originating from the Capitol riot.

A letter received by one of the prosecutors was signed by Bondi and did not provide a reason for their removal other than citing “Article II of the United States Constitution and the laws of the United States,” according to the Associated Press.

One law enforcement official told NBC News that the firings, the first time career prosecutors who worked on the Jan. 6 cases and completed their probationary periods were dismissed, are “horrifying.”

“To fire them, without explanation, is a slap in the face not only to them, but to all career DOJ prosecutors,” the official said. “No one is safe from this administration’s whims and impulses. And the public certainly is not served by the continued brain drain of DOJ — we are losing the best among us every day.”

The Trump administration fired probationary federal prosecutors who worked on the Jan. 6 cases in late January and also terminated prosecutors associated with former special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into President Donald Trump.

Ed Martin, the former interim U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, demoted several prosecutors involved in the Jan. 6 cases in February. Martin previously defended Jan. 6 protesters. He said on a podcast in 2024 that Jan. 6 protesters were regular people.

“I’ve never seen anything so unfair in terms of … how these people are characterized, you know, insurrectionists and felonious, all this stuff,” Martin said.

Some congressional Democrats created replica Jan. 6 plaques commemorating law enforcement officers for their actions that day and asked their Democratic colleagues to hang them outside their offices, as the official plaque commissioned by Congress has not been installed yet.

“If you’re frustrated, like we are, with this embarrassing violation of law and spectacular disregard for the valor, honor and sacrifice of our police officers who responded on that day, please join us by displaying a poster replica of the plaque outside of your office,” the Democrats wrote in the letter.