Judge says alleged D.C. pipe bomber isn’t covered by Trump’s Jan. 6 pardons

A federal judge rejected a motion to dismiss the criminal charges against the man accused of planting pipe bombs outside the Republican National Committee and Democratic National Committee on the eve of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, finding that President Trump’s sweeping pardons of the rioters were “expressly limited” to those who were convicted of their actions that day. 

U.S. District Judge Amir Ali denied a motion by lawyers for Brian Cole Jr. arguing his actions were “inextricably and demonstrably tethered” to the events of Jan. 6 and should be dismissed. 

Cole’s legal team pointed to filings by prosecutors that said Cole had told the FBI he had traveled to Washington, D.C., to attend a 2020 election-related protest, which suggested he was part of “the same political controversy that animated the January 6 crowd.” And they noted that even though the bombs were allegedly planted on Jan. 5, they were discovered on the following afternoon. 

“The Pardon—like it or not—applies to Mr. Cole, based on the ordinary and plain meaning of the Pardon’s language as applied to the relevant facts in this case,” Cole’s lawyers wrote. 

In court filings, the Justice Department argued the pardon explicitly does not cover Cole’s alleged conduct, which Ali agreed with. 

“Even assuming that the conduct Cole is charged with is ‘related to events that occurred at or near the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021,’ the pardon is expressly limited to people who had been ‘convicted of offenses’ related to those events,” Ali wrote in a three-page opinion Monday. “Cole had not been convicted of the conduct at issue when the President issued the pardon; indeed, he was not charged until many months after the President’s proclamation.” 

Cole was charged last year with interstate transportation of explosives and malicious attempt to use explosives almost five years after the bombs were planted. The bombs did not detonate, but the FBI has said that they were viable. In April, federal prosecutors added terrorism and weapons-of-mass-destruction charges against him. 

He pleaded not guilty to the allegations against him. 

Mr. Trump’s Jan. 6 pardons, issued in the first hours of his return to the White House last year, granted clemency to around 1,500 rioters accused or convicted of violations ranging from trespassing to assaulting police.