In one of his first moves as President, Donald Trump granted clemency for some 15 hundred supporters who stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6TH in opposition to the 2020 election results. Jenna Ryan is one of several defendants with connections to North Texas who received a pardon. She said she heard the news with the rest of the world. Jenna Ryan is seen on January 6th in photos and videos surrounded by others who’d stormed the U.S. Capitol. She pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges, considered one of the nonviolent offenders that day, and spent time in federal prison. “Just watching the news, watching with bated breath,” she said. “And then I got, and I was like oh my gosh my world just went really busy. Everybody just started texting me and emailing me.” She’s among several hundred people pardoned for her part in what happened that day and said she feels validated. “At one point I was ostracized from society, and canceled from society and objectified and in all areas and people are afraid of me,” she said. Others said the pardons fly in the face of our judicial system. The Southern Poverty Law Center condemned the move. “Unfortunately, I think when President Trump overrode that verdict and overrode the will of the people within our judicial system, I think that that really sends a message that some people can escape legal accountability in some cases,” said Rachel Carroll Rivas, Interim Dir of Intelligence Project Southern Poverty Law Center Brian Levin is the founding director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism. He said this move energizes January 6TH rioters and their supporters. “It sends a message that this is ok,” he said. “Let’s see what happens if these folks re-offend. And additionally, it adds great vigor to these groups that were previously on the ropes because their leadership was imprisoned.” Ryan said she is not an insurrectionist and believes the video and images of rioters seen storming the Capitol do not tell the full story. “That’s the only angle that that was repeated over and over in the mainstream media. You don’t have the diversity of the things that I saw,” she said. At the time Trump issued the pardons, there were about 700 defendants who either never received prison sentences or had already completed their sentences.