U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., is not intimidated by President-elect Donald Trump, who, during an interview on “Meet the Press,” called for the congressman to be jailed for his role as chairman of the special congressional committee investigating Trump’s role in the Jan. 6, 2021 mob attack on the U.S. Capitol.
“Donald Trump is not a god,” Thompson told theGrio during a recent interview, reacting to Trump’s unsupported claims that the congressman, along with other committee members like vice chair and former Republican Rep. Liz Cheney, destroyed evidence throughout the investigation.
“He can’t prove it, nor has there been any other proof offered, which tells me that he really doesn’t know what he’s talking about,” said the 76-year-old lawmaker, who maintained that he and the bipartisan Jan. 6 Select Committee – which referred Trump for criminal prosecution – were exercising their constitutional and legislative duties.
“When someone disagrees with you, that doesn’t make it illegal; that doesn’t even make it wrong,” he maintained. “The greatness of this country is that everyone can have their own opinion about any subject, and so for an incoming president who disagrees with the work of Congress to say ‘because I disagree, I want them jailed,’ is absolutely unbelievable.”
When asked by theGrio if he is concerned about his physical safety amid continued public ridicule from Trump, whose supporters have already proven to be violent (re: Jan. 6), Rep. Thompson said, “I think every member of Congress here has to have some degree of concern, because you just never know.”
He added, “It’s not helpful when the president of the United States singles out any individual for the perception of doing something wrong.”
According to news reports, President Joe Biden and his White House team are mulling over whether to issue preemptive pardons for political figures like Thompson and others in Donald Trump’s crosshairs, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, federal special prosecutor Jack Smith, and Sen. Adam Schiff of California.
Thompson demurred when asked if he thought President Biden granting such pardons, regardless of whether or not any crimes were committed, was necessary amid concerns Trump would use the executive office to go after his perceived political enemies.
“That pardon power is vested in the president … It’s his prerogative. If he sees that it’s important for citizens in performing their responsibility to be protected, and he gives it, then that’s his right,” the congressman told theGrio. He continued, “I’m not, at this point, engaged in it. I hear the conversation, but I would say that’s the president’s call, and we’ll just wait and see.”
There’s good reason to believe Donald Trump’s previous threats of revenge and “retribution” could become reality when he is sworn in on Jan. 20, 2025. His nominee for FBI director, Kash Patel, a Trump loyalist, published an enemies list in his 2023 book “Government Gangsters” and told Trump’s perceived political opponents and the media that, if Trump was reelected, they would be on his radar.
“I’d be real concerned about someone with [Patel’s] perspective in that sensitive of a position … but again, it’s just a symptom of what’s happening with The Trump administration,” said Rep. Thompson. “The barrier between right and wrong is very narrow and thin so that it becomes what I, the individual wants, rather than what the law says.”
He continued, “And when we move from what the law is to what an individual thinks, in my opinion, that’s a slippery slope, and that’s a slippery slope, especially for a democracy.”
