Pardoned Jan 6 rioter accused of threatening to kill Democrat leader Hakeem Jeffries at NYC event

A January 6 rioter, pardoned by President Donald Trump, has been arrested for allegedly threatening to kill House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, according to a report.

Christopher Moynihan, 34, was arrested Sunday after texting that he planned to “eliminate” Jeffries while he spoke at the Economic Club of New York Monday, according to court documents, obtained by CBS News.

“Hakeem Jeffries makes a speech in a few days in NYC I cannot allow this terrorist to live,” Moynihan, who was pardoned in January by Trump, reportedly wrote in the message.

“Even if I am hated, he must be eliminated, I will kill him for the future,” he allegedly wrote.

Moynihan was one of more than 1,500 Trump supporters charged with crimes connected to the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. He was found guilty in August 2022 of obstructing an official proceeding and pleaded guilty to five misdemeanor charges. He was sentenced in February 2023 to 21 months in prison.

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Prosecutors said Moynihan was one of the first Trump supporters to breach police barricades and enter the Capitol.

At the time of his sentencing, prosecutors said that while inside the Capitol building, Moynihan “rifled through a notebook on top of a Senator’s desk, saying, ‘There’s gotta be something in here we can f***ing use against these scumbags.’”

Moynihan faces a new felony charge of making a terroristic threat, prosecutors said Monday.

He was arrested by New York State Police in Clinton, a small town in the Hudson Valley, about two hours north of Manhattan. An investigation into the incident was started by the FBI, according to CBS.

Moynihan was remanded to the Dutchess County Justice and Transition Center “in lieu of $10,000 cash bail, a $30,000 bond or an $80,000 partially secured bond,” state police said.

He is scheduled to make his first court appearance Thursday in Dutchess County.

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While Moynihan is not the first pardoned Jan 6 rioter to be subsequently arrested on unrelated charges, he is the first to face charges of making a violent threat against a member of Congress, according to CBS.

After returning to office this January, one of Trump’s first official acts as president was commuting the sentences of hundreds of Jan 6 rioters, many of whom were convicted of violent offenses against members of law enforcement.

One police officer was killed and nearly 150 other officers were injured in the attack.

Rioter Ashli Babbit, 35, was shot and killed, while 50-year-old Benjamin Phillips, of Ringtown, Pennsylvania; Kevin Greeson, 55, of Athens, Alabama; and Rosanne Boylan, 34, of Kennesaw, Georgia, died from medical emergencies during the attack.

The White House and Jeffries office did not immediately return a request for comment from The Independent.