President Trump has issued a second pardon to a January 6 defendant who remained imprisoned on separate gun offenses, leading to his release on Friday.
Dan Wilson was one of the supporters of Mr. Trump who breached the Capitol on January 6, 2021. The Justice Department said in a 2024 news release that Wilson was a militia member who entered the building in a gas mask.
He pleaded guilty to a charge of conspiracy to impede or injure a federal officer in May 2024 and was sentenced to five years in prison.
He was pardoned on that charge in January 2025 when Mr. Trump granted clemency for about 1,500 January 6 defendants.
Despite the pardon, Wilson remained incarcerated. Authorities had searched his home in June 2022 as part of their investigation into his presence at the Capitol.
They recovered “numerous firearms and ammunition,” the Justice Department said, which he was forbidden from possessing because of previous felony convictions.
Wilson pled guilty to a charge of possession of a firearm by a prohibited person and a charge of possession of an unregistered firearm, and was set to remain in prison until 2028.
A White House official told CBS News that Mr. Trump was pardoning Wilson because the home search that led to the discovery of the firearms was part of the investigation into Wilson’s January 6 charges.
Wilson’s pardon, reviewed by CBS News, was dated to Friday. He was released from prison on Friday evening, his lawyer George Pallas told.
“For too long, my client has been held as a political prisoner by a government that criminalized dissent,” Pallas said in a statement to CBS News. “President Trump’s pardon rights this wrong and sends a clear message that peaceful Americans will not be persecuted for their beliefs. Mr. Wilson is innocent, he has always been innocent, and this pardon proves it.
“Pro-Trump protesters gather in front of the U.S. Capitol Building on January 6, 2021 in Washington, DC. Jon Cherry / Getty Images
A sprawling legal battle
Wilson’s case became part of a legal debate over whether Mr. Trump’s pardon of January 6-related crimes applied to other offenses discovered in investigations related to those charges. Mr. Trump has downplayed the events of the attack and referred to those jailed in connection with it as “hostages.”
Wilson planned to participate in the riot at the Capitol for weeks, according to the Justice Department’s 2024 news release, and occasionally discussed bringing firearms. He ultimately arrived unarmed.
Throughout the day, he provided information in messaging channels about where people needed support as they worked to enter the Capitol, the Justice Department said. He also spoke to other members of far-right groups, including the Oath Keepers.
The Justice Department initially argued that Trump’s pardons did not extend to Wilson’s gun charges, but later changed its position, saying that it had received “further clarity on the intent of the Presidential Pardon.”
U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich, who oversaw Wilson’s case and was nominated by Mr. Trump during his first term, criticized the move and called efforts to extend the pardon to cover offenses discovered in the course of the investigations “extraordinary,” according to the Associated Press.
Mr. Trump also pardoned Suzanne Kaye, a Florida woman who was sentenced to 18 months in prison for threatening to shoot FBI agents. Kaye was questioned by FBI agents after saying online that she had been at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, according to CBS Miami. When contacted by agents, Kaye denied she had been there, but still agreed to speak with them at her home.
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