Mark McCloskey is eagerly waiting for details to emerge on how to apply for the Trump administration’s new $1.8 billion settlement fund, both for himself and for the Jan. 6 rioters he represents as a lawyer. “Everybody’s very excited about it,” McCloskey said. “It’s the first ray of light we’ve seen in a long time.”
McCloskey gained national notoriety in 2020, after viral videos showed him and his wife standing outside their St. Louis home, pointing guns at demonstrators protesting racial injustice. The next year, the couple pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges. Even though he was pardoned by the Missouri governor, McCloskey said his reputation was damaged; Google results describe him as “former personal injury lawyer” even though he still practices, so he is considering applying for the “anti-weaponization fund.”
Since that incident in 2020, one of his legal causes has been aiding people prosecuted for their actions during the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. Last year, he said he advocated for a fund to support those charged, meeting with Justice Department officials to make the case for compensation similar to that given to the families of the victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
McCloskey and other pro-Trump attorneys say they are awaiting key information about the fund from the administration, including who will be eligible, how much money each claimant can receive and who will be in charge of disbursing the cash.
As for who might be compensated, Vice President JD Vance told reporters on Tuesday that “anybody can apply for it,” including Democrats.
The fund is widely expected to go toward people charged in the Jan. 6 attack, those who say they were wrongly prosecuted by the Biden administration and those who tried to help President Donald Trump overturn the results of the 2020 election. Lawyers for those Trump supporters have said their clients are interested in making claims.
Former Republican congressman George Santos, who had his sentence for identity theft and wire fraud commuted by Trump last year, said Wednesday that he was considering applying for the fund but that he wasn’t seeking compensation. He said he wanted an apology from the government for what he alleged was selective prosecution.
“It’s not a monetary issue for me. I’m not injured. I’m able to maintain income,” Santos said. “I want to correct the record. I think it’s a great avenue to do so.”
Former Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich, who was pardoned by Trump after he was convicted for trying to sell President Barack Obama’s vacant Senate seat in 2011, said he hasn’t yet considered whether he might apply for the fund. But he said he believes more needs to be done to hold accountable the prosecutors who brought the case against him, whom he described as the “liars and the dirty, dirty cheats of the world, to quote Taylor Swift.”
“’Til I die, I’m not going to stop seeking vindication,” he said. “If this is the vehicle, I haven’t given it much thought.”
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Peter Ticktin, a Florida-based attorney, said he is in touch with hundreds of Jan. 6 defendants and expects many to seek compensation. He said that could include people such as Andrew Taake, who is suing the federal government, alleging that he was mistreated during his detention after the Capitol attack and wrongly injected with estrogen while he was held in prison.
Taake went to the Capitol in 2021, while on pretrial release for a child solicitation case in Texas. A police officer accused him of attacking officers with bear spray when the crowd rushed past a police barricade. After he was released from prison following Trump’s pardon last year, Taake pleaded guilty to a second-degree felony in relation to his previous charges but served no additional time in prison, although he registered as a sex offender as part of the deal.
On Tuesday, acting attorney general Todd Blanche was asked by Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Maryland) during congressional testimony whether he would commit to rules preventing certain offenders from being eligible, describing the case of Andrew Paul Johnson, who was sentenced to life in prison for child molestation after he was pardoned for Jan. 6 offenses. He was accused of telling children that he would give them a share of the restitution he expected to earn after his Jan. 6 conviction.
Blanche did not directly say whether he would commit to such a rule and disputed the basis of the question, saying no fund existed at the time of Johnson’s claims.
Ticktin also represents Tina Peters, a former Republican county clerk in Colorado who was convicted for her role in a scheme to breach the security of election equipment in an effort to find evidence that the 2020 election was stolen. Trump said he pardoned Peters — a symbolic gesture since she was convicted of state crimes, rather than federal crimes — and following the president’s declaration, Colorado Gov. Jared Polis granted her clemency.
Vance suggested on Tuesday that Peters might be among those eligible for the fund, even though her prosecution was brought by the state and not the federal government.
Ticktin said he wasn’t sure what the vice president had in mind, but that he would be seeking more information and expected the fund could help other former Trump aides who sought to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, including Roger Stone, Peter Navarro and Mark Meadows.
“This was magnanimous of the president to make sure the money that would go to his wallet will go to American patriots,” Ticktin said.
Yvonne St Cyr, who crawled through a Senate office window to enter the Capitol on Jan. 6, was sentenced to 2½ years in prison and ordered to pay thousands of dollars in restitution and fines before Trump pardoned her last year. She said in an interview that the money is hers, and that she will be seeking compensation through the fund since she has been banned from driving for Lyft or using Airbnb.
Family friends criticized her, and she lost her marriage when she went to prison, she said, adding that the real vindication will only happen when the media and banks collapse and the administration finally proves the 2020 election was stolen.
“I hope I get $10 million but the dollar collapses like it should,” she said.
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