Five Republicans from the US House of Representatives asked then-President Donald Trump for a pardon for their role in the plan to change the 2020 election results. That became clear Thursday during a public hearing of the parliamentary committee investigating the storming of the Capitol on January 6, 2021.
They are Mo Brooks, Matt Gaetz, Andy Biggs, Louie Gohmert and Scott Perry. The five Republicans attended a meeting with the president in December 2020 to discuss options for changing the election results. They asked about the possibility of a so-called preventive pardon, which the president can grant before a sentence is imposed or someone is even found guilty of a crime.
A preventive pardon is not common in the US, but has happened before. Gerald Ford gave one to his predecessor Richard Nixon in 1974. He had resigned over the Watergate scandal, but no charges had yet been filed against him.