Another J6er Has Been Arrested… for conspiring to kill the FBI agents who investigated him
About Edward Kelley and his conviction
Back on June 12, I wrote an article about a woman named Pamela Hemphill who DECLINED President Trump’s pardon for her participation in the January 6 Insurrection. Within that article, I made the point that since the pardon, at least fourteen other people (of the 1,500+ pardoned) have since run into trouble with the law. But ultimately, I said that I hoped Hemphill’s bravery was a sign that more people would come forward to prove the narrative that most J6ers were really just “friends, neighbors, family, and peers who were led astray by the radicalizing rhetoric of Trump and his sycophantic cronies.” I think it’s a pretty hopeful piece, honestly.
My hope still remains that this could be true, even in light of the news that Edward Kelley, a man pardoned for his early entry into the Capitol building on January 6, will be serving life in prison… for creating a “kill list” of FBI agents.
“The Justice Department argued Kelley created a "kill list" of FBI agents and others who investigated his role in the Jan. 6 siege. Prosecutors said Kelley "distributed this list — along with videos containing images of certain FBI employees identified on the list — to a co-conspirator as part of his 'mission.'”
A jury convicted Kelley of conspiracy charges in November, and a federal judge in the Eastern District of Tennessee sentenced Kelley to life in prison on Tuesday.”
Edward Kelley’s pardon was always unique in the sense that it did not cover his Tennessee conspiracy case. Prosecutors claim he held no remorse for his plans, as he was a “patriot” for plotting to murder law enforcement. His list was not just names, either; it included titles of officers AND cell phone numbers. It appears that the punishment, in this case, definitively fits the crime.
Yet if you were to ask me today, I think that it’s likely the average J6er will still take this opportunity to do something better with the second chance they’ve been afforded. To my understanding, no other J6ers have been arrested and charged with any crimes since the article a month ago, which leaves the number at around 10-14 people of the 1,500+ pardoned who have re-committed a crime.
Does that make what they did on January 6 okay? No. In my opinion, these people should not have been pardoned, especially the orchestrators such as Enrique Tarrio and Stewart Rhodes, since what they did was very clearly an act of treason committed upon the Capitol. But at least one group of J6ers have devoted themselves to a cause greater than themselves they may not have found interest in were it not for J6: in a story that got stuck between the cracks back in March, The Washington Post reports that a number of J6ers have started prison reform nonprofits.
“In Washington state, the wife of a Jan. 6 defendant started a nonprofit to help children with incarcerated parents,” Ellie Silverman writes. “Another J6er is part of the team behind Stop Hate, an organization that supports Jan. 6 defendants and says that it wants Congress to address neglected medical needs while incarcerated, due-process violations and changes to solitary confinement.”
Time will tell if good will come from any of this. But I remain optimistic for once that Donald Trump may find that one of his biggest adversaries is somebody he granted a pardon to, or that J6 remains a cult-ish fluke for many of those whose pardons cannot now be overturned.
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They work for ICE now, so yeah, I think your hope leans a bit toward delusional - sorry
If they can go after FBI, then we can go after ICE.