Police officer Daniel Hodges was attacked on Jan. 6, 2021, at the Capitol. He was also on duty during President Trump’s inauguration last month. He reflects on the pardons attackers received.
AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
Daniel Hodges works in the civil disturbance unit of Washington D.C.’s Metropolitan Police Department. He was working on Inauguration Day.
DANIEL HODGES: Inauguration is like the Super Bowl for law enforcement in D.C. I mean, people measure how long they have until retirement by how many more inaugurations they have to work.
RASCOE: This was not Hodges’ first inauguration on the job. But this year, when Donald Trump took the oath of office for a second time, Hodges says it felt different.
HODGES: It was weird ’cause, you know, the last time I saw all those MAGA hats in D.C. was on January 6, 2021.
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HODGES: (Screaming).
RASCOE: Those are his screams as Hodges was crushed by pro-Trump rioters on January 6 and repeatedly assaulted. He spoke with NPR’s Tom Dreisbach about the month since Trump returned to office and pardoned the men convicted of assaulting him, as well as the preemptive pardon that former President Biden granted him just before leaving office.
TOM DREISBACH, BYLINE: For Daniel Hodges, it was hard not to think of January 6 when he was working Inauguration Day. In his personal time – and we should say he talked to NPR in his personal capacity, not on behalf of the police department – Hodges has been outspoken in his opposition to Trump ever since the attack on the Capitol. And so there was a question on Inauguration Day. Would anyone in the crowd recognize him? No one did.
HODGES: So I didn’t have any issues in that regard, but it was – it is sad.
DREISBACH: You know, there were people who were at January 6, convicted rioters, who were part of the inauguration festivities who are celebrating, and I’m just thinking about you on the streets protecting them.
HODGES: Right. Yeah. It’s quite the turnabout, isn’t it? I don’t know (laughter). I struggle to find something worthwhile to say about it. You know, it’s – I hate the phrase because it’s overused and so rendered meaningless, but it is what it is.
DREISBACH: Were you surprised by the decision by Trump and the administration to pardon the people who assaulted you?
HODGES: Not really. I mean, he campaigned on it. He made it very clear that he believed these people did no wrong. In fact, they did right by attacking the Capitol in his name.
DREISBACH: I will say, I was personally surprised that he went as far as he did with the people who were really violent. Even JD Vance was saying, obviously…
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VICE PRESIDENT JD VANCE: If you committed violence on that day, obviously, you shouldn’t be pardoned.
HODGES: Yeah, did you really think Trump was going to sit there and go through 1,500 case files and be like, well, this guy did this X, Y and Z, so maybe not him? He’s just going to pardon them all.
DREISBACH: You know, on the same day, I guess it was that morning, maybe you got the news about Biden, President Biden, giving you a pardon preemptively, along with the other officers who testified to the January 6 committee.
HODGES: Yeah.
DREISBACH: What were your thoughts on that?
HODGES: Oh, I mean, initially, surprise. I mean…
DREISBACH: You hadn’t been talking with him?
HODGES: Oh, no, I received zero communication from the Biden administration on this. I found out about it when a journalist texted me that morning and asking my – asking me my thoughts on my own pardon. And I was, like, what (laughter)? So I looked in the news, and I found it. I was like, oh. So I received a presidential pardon for unknown crimes that I did not commit, which is a novel sensation.
DREISBACH: Does it, like, come in the mail (laughter)?
HODGES: I…
DREISBACH: What happens?
HODGES: Yeah, I don’t know. I mean, I’m glad that Biden thought to protect me from this Department of Justice. But God, I – yeah, I got a pardon for things that I haven’t done. I don’t know how to feel about that.
DREISBACH: Were you genuinely worried about retaliation from this administration?
HODGES: I thought it was a possibility.
DREISBACH: The other thing that people who prosecuted these cases, other officers – people have been talking about harassment or threats that they’ve gotten from January 6 defendants. Have you thought about getting a protective order, a kind of restraining order, against anybody, people who assaulted you and who are now free?
HODGES: I think that’d be great. Unfortunately, the Department of Justice has indicated that they’re unable to give us – us being law enforcement officers – the information we would need to fill out those kind of protective orders because the convicted – the people who attacked us and attacked the Capitol, in the eyes of the Justice Department, are no longer criminals, are no longer subject to, you know, the conviction. So they’re not able to give us that information.
DREISBACH: How do you think, now that we’re in this period where the January 6 defendants have been pardoned – Trump – I don’t know if you saw this – recently said that they didn’t assault, was his quote, they were assaulted by our government. And of course, you were assaulted. You know, how do you think about keeping the memory and the truth of January 6 from being whitewashed?
HODGES: I – it should be easy, right? This is the most recorded crime in history. Everybody had their phones out, was tweeting, recording video, taking pictures. There’s no shortage of evidence of the crime, but somehow people have gotten into this headspace where none of that matters, that everything’s a lie, that we’re all crisis actors or lizard people or whatever it is. So I mean, I just have to hope that people still believe – some people still believe the evidence that is out there, and I have to keep being a living witness to what occurred and trust that someone will hear me.
DREISBACH: After Daniel Hodges and I talked, I contacted the Justice Department to ask about what he said – that they’re not helping him get the information needed to file for a court order to prevent harassment by the men convicted of assaulting him. They did not respond.
Tom Dreisbach, NPR News.
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