Ryan Kelley thought he had a good shot at becoming Michigan’s governor in 2022. That is, until he was charged with misdemeanors for participating in the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol. His campaign sputtered and he finished fourth out of five candidates in the Republican primary.
Three years later, Kelley says, people ask him all the time to run for governor again. In today’s America, where President Donald Trump returned to the White House and within hours pardoned some 1,500 Jan. 6 rioters, Kelley’s two-month prison sentence for his actions that winter day in 2021 isn’t the obstacle to public life that it might once have been.
It may even be a ticket to political prominence.
Far from being sidelined, those who rioted, assaulted police officers or broke into congressional offices during the violent attack are now being spotlighted as honored guest speakers at local Republican events around the country. They are getting a platform to tell their version of events and being hailed as heroes and martyrs. Some are considering runs for office, recognizing that at least among a certain segment of the pro-Trump base, they are seen not as criminals but as patriots.
Kelley, a 43-year-old commercial real estate developer, is among those fielding new opportunities in the political arena.
At a recent county Republican committee event in Jackson, Michigan, Kelley was met with hugs and handshakes. Dozens of attendees hollered and clapped when he introduced himself as “your favorite J6er.” They gasped and shook their heads as Kelley recalled how his young son thought he was dead while he was in federal prison. They urged him to run for governor again in 2026. It is something he said he is debating.
After Kelley finished speaking, attendees said they were touched by his story.
“I’ve done much worse and did no jail time,” said 58-year-old Todd Gillman, a woodworker and Republican chairman for the local congressional district. “Thank God people like Ryan Kelley are not intimidated by the lawfare that was used against them.”
Rioters become symbols of government overreach
It makes sense that Republicans are seizing the chance to showcase Jan. 6 rioters, said Matt Dallek, a historian at George Washington University who studies the conservative movement. Trump has likened those rioters to ” political prisoners ” and ” warriors ” for defending him and his false claims that the 2020 election won by Democrat Joe Biden was stolen. There is no credible evidence the 2020 election was tainted or that Trump was the winner — facts backed up by federal and state election officials and Trump’s own attorney general. Trump’s allegations of fraud were also roundly rejected by courts, including by judges appointed by Trump.
“Those who are pardoned can testify, like no one else can, to the horrific power of the federal government to destroy their lives,” Dallek said. “It’s a potent rallying cry, and also probably a potent fundraising tool.”
But there also is a danger to elevating them, he said. Many of those pardoned by the Republican president used violence to stop the peaceful transfer of power, and juries determined their actions to be criminal.
“It is, I think, a mainstreaming, a growing acceptance on the right of political violence, as long as it’s done in the service of Trump and his ongoing election lie,” Dallek said.
Kelley, who did not commit violence or enter the Capitol, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor trespassing charge. He said he saw some things at the Capitol — people breaking windows, for example — that he did not like. But he also flatly denied an audience member’s use of the term “insurrection.”
“It was a protest that turned into a little bit of a scuffle later in the day for a couple of minutes, right?” he told the nodding crowd in Jackson, a midsize city west of Detroit that residents say hosted the first official meeting of the Republican Party in 1854.
Extensive video footage and testimony from the events inside the Capitol on Jan. 6 show more than a scuffle as a mob of Trump supporters — some armed with poles, bats and bear spray — overwhelmed law enforcement, shattered windows and sent lawmakers and aides running into hiding. More than 100 police officers were injured, with some dragged into the crowd and beaten or attacked with makeshift weapons.
Kelley said the reason he pleaded guilty was to avoid more serious charges. That differed from his tone in his sentencing hearing in 2023, when he told the judge that his actions outside the Capitol, from crossing the police line to riling up other rioters and ripping a tarp, were wrong. The judge told Kelley: “I think you misused the platform that you had as a candidate for elected office to minimize and, frankly, to lie about what happened.”
As he gazed out at an American flag banner while addressing the crowd in Jackson, Kelley said he “was a political prisoner for standing up for what I believe was right.”
That resonated with attendee Marilyn Acton, a 68-year-old mental health counselor. She hopes pardoned Jan. 6 rioters such as Kelley become more involved in Republican politics.
“I would like them to totally get involved, because I think people need to know the truth,” she said.
Pardoned, platformed and protested
By The Associated Press’ count, at least two dozen local Republican groups nationwide in recent months have invited Jan. 6 rioters to speak at regular meetings or special fundraisers, some with titles such as “Insurrection Hoax” and “Patriots Vindicated.”
They include people who only trespassed at the Capitol but also rioters who were convicted and pardoned for more serious crimes such as carrying a firearm on Capitol grounds or violently attacking law enforcement.
The Western Wake Republican Club in North Carolina in March featured remarks from James Grant, a pardoned rioter who was among the first to assault police officers and breach a security perimeter during the attack on the Capitol.
Grant, who later climbed into the Capitol through a broken window and entered a senator’s office, used the stage to reiterate his belief that the 2020 election was stolen and suggest that the actions on the front line of the riots were led by “undercovers and federal agents.” In a video recording of the event, he also decried the conditions in prison and said the experience was traumatic for him.
A Republican women’s club in Lawrence County, Tennessee, earlier this month hosted an event for Ronald Colton McAbee. He was employed as a sheriff’s deputy in Tennessee when he went to Capitol, dragging an officer away from a police line and punching another officer who tried to stop him.
McAbee told the crowd the jury that convicted him of five felonies was biased and said he had been trying to help the officer in the melee. He encouraged those listening to get involved in politics and said he had considered running for office himself.
“It has been a thought, and we’ll see what happens,” he said in a video recording of the event.
McAbee pleaded guilty to two counts, including a felony assault charge, before a federal jury convicted him of five other counts. He was on medical leave from the Williamson County Sheriff’s Office when he and a friend drove to Washington, D.C., for the “Stop the Steal” rally. He wore a bulletproof vest with two patches — one that said “SHERIFF” and another bearing an insignia for the Three Percenters militia movement — when he stormed the Capitol.
Some of the local GOP groups welcoming Jan. 6 rioters have faced pushback from their communities, prompting them to relocate or even cancel scheduled events.
In California, the Association of Monterey Bay Conservatives’ event featuring six pardoned rioters faced so much public backlash that three potential venues canceled, according to TV station KSBW. When the event was ultimately held at the fourth venue in Salinas, protesters gathered outside the building.
The Monterey Peace and Justice Center, a local nonprofit that condemned the event, said in an emailed statement that “rebranding these rioters as heroes is a dangerous distortion of history.”
Event organizer Karen Weissman told the AP in an email the group believed that it was “important for our community to hear their stories and hear a different perspective.”
David Becker, a former Justice Department lawyer and co-author of “The Big Truth,” a book about Trump’s 2020 election falsehoods, said he is troubled by anyone who would reward or celebrate what happened on Jan. 6.
“We have to agree as a constitutional republic, as a democracy, that elections and the rule of law have meaning,” he said. “And if we lose that meaning, if we attack our own institutions, we are going down a path where something even worse could happen in the future.”
From conviction to candidacy
Some pardoned rioters are taking things a step beyond speaking at political events and setting their sights on local, state or even federal office.
Jake Lang, who was charged with assaulting an officer, civil disorder and other crimes before he was pardoned by Trump, recently announced he is running for Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s vacant U.S. Senate seat in Florida.
Enrique Tarrio, the former Proud Boys leader who was sentenced to 22 years in prison after being convicted of seditious conspiracy and other crimes before his full pardon, said in an interview with Newsmax that he will take a “serious look at running for office” in 2026 or 2028 and believes his “future is in politics.”
In Texas, pardoned rioter Ryan Nichols announced a run for Congress but withdrew days later.
Kelley, who has been asked to attend various political events around Michigan in recent months, said he is debating another run for governor in 2026, but is not sure he can commit his young family to the grind of the campaign. He said he wants Michigan to win, whether or not he is the one in office.
Still, he recognizes that Trump’s pardons have opened a window of opportunity that may not last forever.
“Now is kind of the time that I could catapult with that, right?” he said in an interview. “We get a lot of hate, but I’m also going to get a lot of support.”
Associated Press writer Christina A. Cassidy in Atlanta contributed to this report. The Associated Press receives support from several private foundations to enhance its explanatory coverage of elections and democracy. See more about the AP’s democracy initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
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