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Podcaster Tim Pool tore into leftist political commentator Luke Beasley on the latest episode of the "Timcast IRL" podcast for making blanket condemnations of Jan. 6 protesters and for pre-emptively criticizing their pardoning by President-elect Donald Trump from a place of apparent ignorance about the specifics of their cases.
Early in the episode, Pool and Beasley discussed leftists' celebration of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson's alleged assassin, Luigi Mangione. When pressed for comment about his fellow leftists' apparent justifications for Thompson's killing, Sen. Elizabeth Warren's (D-Mass.) recent remarks in particular, Beasley tried changing the subject.
"She's not advocating for Biden to pardon Luigi," said the former Harris booster. "You know who is going to pardon violent people? Did Trump say he was going to pardon violent [Jan. 6 protesters]?"
Beasley appeared desperate to equate efforts by leftists to excuse an alleged targeted murder with Trump's promised pardons for some of the roughly 1,500 individuals charged and hundreds convicted in connection with the Jan. 6, 2021, protests at the U.S. Capitol.
Blaze News previously reported that according to the Department of Justice, nearly 1,000 people have pleaded guilty to Jan. 6 charges, 68% for misdemeanors and 32% for felonies. Of those who pleaded guilty to felonies, 53% were for supposedly assaulting law enforcement officers.
'How long should they be in prison for?'
Trump suggested to "Meet the Press" in a Dec. 8 interview that whereas those involved in the deadly BLM riots, which inflicted billions of dollars of damage on the nation, largely got out legally unscathed, Jan. 6 protesters were alternatively rounded up and treated "unfair[ly]."
After Trump indicated that he would initiate pardons for Jan. 6 protesters on Day One, NBC News' Kristen Welker asked the president-elect whether he would consider also pardoning violent protesters. Trump insinuated that some of the convictions for violent crimes were bogus and said, "I'm going to look at everything. We're going to look at individual cases."
Pool seized upon Beasley's intimation that the pardons, particularly for supposedly violent Jan. 6 rioters, were necessarily condemnable, asking, "If someone attacks a cop, how long should they go to jail for?"
"I don't know," responded the leftist. "A while. ... Totally depends on the details of the assault."
Pool noted that some of the Jan. 6 protesters who Trump might pardon have been rotting in prison for roughly three years, then pressed the issue once again: "How long should they be in prison for?"
Beasley suggested that he would have to consider each of the cases one-by-one, prompting Pool to conclude that the need for such an individualized review should be grounds for avoiding a blanket condemnation of Trump's proposed pardons.
'You've taken a tribal position and people are suffering because of it.'
"No, because I think that the prosecutors who brought these cases then brought them in front of a jury and got convictions should be respected," said Beasley. "I think that those outcomes should be respected."
Pool became audibly frustrated after it became clear that Beasley's stance on the pardons hinged on a blind trust in the politically-charged prosecutions before juries drawn from an area where over 90% of voters cast ballots for the Democratic candidate in the last two presidential elections.
"If you've got someone on a misdemeanor charge who has been held without trial, a pardon makes perfect sense unless you're a fascist," said Pool. "You've taken the Otto Von Bismarck approach of it is better that 10 innocent people suffer than one guilty person escape."
"You don't know anything about these January 6 cases. You don't [know] why these people are in jail," continued Pool. "And when Donald Trump says these people have been held for too long, you say, 'No. Trump is wrong. Keep them locked up.' That's f***ing fascist, dude. You have been sitting here with no knowledge of the specifics of some of these cases."
Blaze News investigative reporter Joe Hanneman noted last week that Jalise and Mark Middleton of Forestburg, Texas, were among those convicted of assault, resisting, or impeding police officers. The couple, married for 34 years with no criminal history, claimed they were praying together when shoved into the police line on Jan. 6. Jalise Middleton alleged on X that her husband tried protecting her when police attacked her.
Pool got progressively angrier as he began reflecting on how leftists have alternatively been given a relative pass.
"On May 29, 2020, when thousands of far-leftists firebombed the White House grounds, and set fire to St. John's Church, and injured 100 police officers, how many f***ing people went to prison for three years? How many of them who never showed up on that day are in prison for 20 years?" said Pool. "You don't care what the facts are. You don't care if this is unjust. You only care that the machine state has decreed, 'You are now to be locked up.'"
Midway through Pool's over three-minute rant — during which Beasley sat in stunned silence — the host noted, "You don't know. You don't care. You've taken a tribal position, and people are suffering because of it. Now you say that Donald Trump saying the injustice that we've seen warrants commutatio[n] pardons, you say that means it's advocating for violence. This is the ultimate problem."
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