Lead impeachment manager Raskin: If Trump wins, pardoned Jan. 6 rioters will commit more violence

Congressman Jamie Raskin (D-MD) held a press conference in Concord Monday afternoon, laying out in clear terms the dangers he sees from a second term of President Donald Trump will represent to both New Hampshire and the United States as a whole.

Joined by state Senate Democratic leader Donna Soucy and Congresswoman Annie Kuster, Raskin highlighted Trump’s promise to pardon individuals convicted of participating in the January 6 Insurrection on the Capitol, saying they would again engage in violence on his behalf if their convictions were overturned.

“America should take note, when Donald Trump talks about pardoning his friends and allies he means it,” Raskin said. “He’s already pardoned convicted criminals Michael Flynn, Roger Stone, Dinesh D’Souza and numerous other people who have come to form the inner core of his 2024 political campaign, and now he is promising to pardon people who will become the shock troops of political violence in this country if and when they are released from jail.”

Rep. Raskin was also asked about the letter the Democratic National Committee sent to the New Hampshire Democratic Party over the weekend, calling the results of their pre-primary caucus “meaningless.’ This response stems from the state party’s long-simmering disagreement with the DNC over the schedule of the primary calendar.

When asked if he thought New Hampshire’s primary was meaningless, Rep. Raskin broke with the DNC, saying the language went too far.

“I don’t think any kind of politics is meaningless that we see other really than Donald Trump speeches. So I guess I would take exception to that characterization, at least of what I’ve seen.”

In response to a question on if the letter constituted voter suppression, Rep. Kuster said she did not think New Hampshire voters would pay attention to what the DNC had to say about the New Hampshire primary.

“To be honest, I don’t think the voters are focused at all about some committee in Washington, DC,” Kuster said. “What we’re seeing in the organizing is this [Biden Write-In effort] is a completely spontaneous, grassroots, from the bottom up operation that makes me incredibly proud of the New Hampshire primary. And frankly, I think when the results are in, we will demonstrate why the New Hampshire primary is so important.”

Shortly after the press conference the New Hampshire Attorney General’s office sent a cease and desist letter to the DNC in response to their letter over the weekend, stating that their letter to the NHDP constituted unlawful voter suppression.