President Donald Trump said Wednesday he would look at pardoning the men convicted in a scheme to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, and swiped at the legitimacy of the case, which was brought during his first term.
“I will take a look at it. It’s been brought to my attention,” Trump said while speaking to reporters in the Oval Office during the swearing-in of Jeanine Pirro, the new U.S. Attorney for Washington, D.C.
He said that he had watched the trial and that “it looked to me like somewhat of a railroad job.”
"You know, they were drinking, and I think they said stupid things, but I’ll take a look at that," Trump added.
Over a dozen people were charged in connection with the plot to kidnap Whitmer, a Democrat, though only some of them were tried in federal court and thus eligible for a pardon from Trump. A federal judge sentenced the ringleader of the group, Barry Croft Jr., to over 19 years in prison and handed Adam Fox, another key player, 16 years.
A spokesperson for Whitmer declined to comment on the president's remarks.
In 2020, Whitmer placed some of the blame for the kidnapping plot on Trump's rhetoric, saying that he "refused to condemn white supremacists and hate groups like these two Michigan militia groups,” referring to Trump's comments at the presidential debate against Joe Biden.
Whitmer said that "hate groups heard the president’s words not as a rebuke, but as a rallying cry” and “a call to action."
"When our leaders meet with, encourage, or fraternize with domestic terrorists, they legitimize their actions and they are complicit," she added.
Whitmer, widely viewed as a potential 2028 presidential contender, has met with Trump several times this year, including a memorable visit to the Oval Office last month at which she was photographed covering her face with a binder.
A spokesperson for Whitmer said at the time that she was surprised to have been brought into a news conference "without any notice of the subject matter” and defended her appearance as "not an endorsement of the actions taken or statements made at that event."
The Democratic governor appeared with Trump a few weeks later to announce a new fighter jet mission at Selfridge Air Force Base, in Macomb County, Michigan, before the president held a nearby rally to mark his first 100 days in office.
Whitmer also met with him in March while in D.C. for a policy retreat with House Democrats. She said their meeting was "productive."
Trump is not the first in the administration to entertain the possibility that those involved in the kidnapping plot could garner a fresh look.
In a recent interview, the Justice Department’s new pardon attorney, Ed Martin, called the case a “fed-napping” plot, an apparent reference to the use of undercover FBI agents and informants to build the case, and invoked the convictions as a potential instance of the “weaponization of government.”
Martin also said would take a “hard look” at the case and likened the men to those convicted on charges related to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. Trump, on his first day in office, granted blanket clemency to those charged with being involved in the riot, issuing roughly 1,500 pardons and commuting the sentences of 14 people.
