Trump saluted the J6 Prison Choir. How he is trying to rewrite history of deadly Capitol riot

Former President Donald Trump's campaign rally in Ohio last Saturday began with an announcer asking the crowd to stand for the national anthem. But this wasn't just a typical rendition of the "Star-Spangled Banner:" It was a recording made by jailed individuals accused of crimes related to the Jan. 6, 2021, storming of the U.S. Capitol.

"Ladies and gentlemen, please rise for the horribly and unfairly treated January 6th hostages," the announcer said. Trump saluted while the song played, his hand on the brim of a red Make America Great Again hat.

This is not the first time Trump has played the "J6 Prison Choir's" recording of the national anthem. At the first rally of his presidential campaign in March 2023, Trump took the stage in Waco, Texas, and put his hand over his heart while the recording played. Trump also kicked off a rally in Georgia this month with the Prison Choir recording.

After the recording ended on Saturday, Trump said, "You see the spirit from the hostages" and called them “unbelievable patriots” who have “been treated terribly and very unfairly," even as there is reason to believe some Prison Choir members may have assaulted police officers.

The recording − titled “Justice for All” − was released commercially on March 3, 2023. It features Trump saying the "Pledge of Allegiance" while the Prison Choir sings the "Star-Spangled Banner."

It is part of Trump’s efforts to try to whitewash what happened when a mob of his supporters overran the Capitol to stop Congress from certifying President Joe Biden’s victory.

The attack on the Capitol shocked the nation, led to Trump’s second impeachment and contributed to felony charges being filed against the former president for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election. Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell said after Jan. 6 that Trump had “totally discredited himself," according to the book "This Will Not Pass."

“He put a gun to his head and pulled the trigger,” McConnell said.

Yet much like Trump has tried to turn his 91 felony charges spanning four different criminal cases to his political advantage by portraying himself as the victim of overzealous prosecutors with political motivations, he has embraced the Jan. 6 defendants on the campaign trail.

It seems to have worked: he is now the presumptive Republican nominee and McConnell endorsed Trump earlier this month.

'I have murder in my heart'

Trump’s attempt to rewrite the history of Jan. 6 comes as the U.S. Department of Justice continues to charge more people with crimes stemming from that day.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia announced earlier this month that 1,358 people have been charged with Jan. 6 crimes.

Of those, 769 pled guilty and another 152 have been found guilty at trial so far.

Many of the Jan. 6 defendants were charged with serious offenses.

“Approximately 486 defendants have been charged with assaulting, resisting, or impeding officers or employees, including approximately 127 individuals who have been charged with using a deadly or dangerous weapon or causing serious bodily injury to an officer,” according to the Department of Justice, which estimates that 140 officers were assaulted on Jan. 6.

It’s not clear which Jan. 6 defendants participated in the recording that Trump plays at his rallies, but many of the defendants held in the Washington, D.C., jail around the time when the recording apparently was made assaulted officers.

An individual who advised the group that made the recording told the Washington Post that it was made in February of 2023 at the D.C. jail, but said she did not know who the singers are. Jan. 6 defendants in the D.C. jail regularly gathered at 9 p.m. to sing the national anthem. The recording’s producers declined to identify the singers to the Post, as did the Trump campaign.

Trump promotes himself as a steadfast supporter of law enforcement and is running as a "law and order" candidate who would get tough on violent criminals.

“They’re the greatest people, the police,” Trump said last year at a campaign event in Iowa.

The Trump campaign ignored a request by USA TODAY to identify the J6 Prison Choir members, and a question about the possibility that some Choir members assaulted police officers.

Instead, Trump National Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement that "Joe Biden's Department of Justice has spent more time prosecuting President Trump and targeting Americans for peacefully protesting on January 6th than criminals, illegal immigrants, and terrorists who are committing violent crimes in Democrat-run cities every day. President Trump will restore justice for all Americas who have been unfairly treated by Joe Biden's two-tier system of justice."

An analysis published by Just Security, an online forum hosted by the New York University School of Law, found that the vast majority of Jan. 6 defendants held in the D.C. Jail on March 13, 2023, were accused of assaulting officers.

The analysis was conducted by Tom Joscelyn, Norman Eisen and Fred Wertheimer. Joscelyn was a staff member on the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, while Eisen served in President Barack Obama’s administration as special counsel. Wertheimer is president of Democracy 21, a good-government group that runs a "TrumpWatch" program.

They obtained a list from the D.C. Department of Corrections that included all of the Jan. 6 defendants held in the D.C. jail last year on March 13.

The list names 20 individuals, and 17 of them were accused of assaulting law enforcement officers.

“It’s highly likely that some of the people in the analysis are in that recording,” by the Prison Choir, Joscelyn said.

Among the 17 are Shane Jenkins and Jonathan Mellis. Both men also were identified by the Washington Post as participating in a rendition of the National Anthem from the D.C. jail that was captured in a video posted online last year. The Post identified five individuals, including Jenkins and Mellis, among 15 in the video “using physical characteristics and interviews with family members, supporters and attorneys.”

The Trump campaign referred the Post to the video − which was posted online by one of the defendants lawyers on March 1 of last year − when asked about the origin of “Justice for All."

Jenkins was sentenced in October to 84 months in prison.

A Department of Justice news release states that "Jenkins hurled nine different objects at the officers, including a solid wooden desk drawer ... a flagpole, a metal walking stick, and a broken wooden pole with a spear-like point."

"In a message sent to an associate following the events of January 6th, Jenkins wrote, 'I have murder in my heart and head. ... I'm not over this election,'" according to the DOJ release.

Mellis was sentenced in December to 51 months in prison.

Citing court documents, the Department of Justice said Mellis used a "large wooden stick like a sword and stabbed at the faces and heads of officers at least five times, violently striking some officers in the face, head, neck, and body area."

Another man identified in the video analyzed by the Post and included in the report published by Just Security is William Chrestman, who is described by the Department of Justice as a member of the Kansas City chapter of the Proud Boys right-wing extremist group.

Members of the Proud Boys are accused of helping orchestrate the attack on the Capitol. Former Proud Boy National Chairman Henry "Enrique" Tarrio was sentenced to 22 years in prison for his role in the attack.

Trump’s use of the Prison Choir recording isn’t the only way he has embraced Jan. 6 defendants. He also spoke at a fundraiser for them, talked about pardoning them and physically embraced one woman at a rally.

“I think he’s gone way beyond just trying to change the narrative around Jan. 6,” Joscelyn said. “I think he’s openly celebrating and endorsing Jan. 6. He’s become the pro Jan. 6 candidate. He’s saying the people who attacked the Capitol on Jan. 6 were in the right and everybody else was in the wrong, so that’s a morally inverted message that he’s preaching.”

Impact of Trump's J6 rhetoric

Trump's efforts may be contributing to changing views on Jan. 6 among some voters.

A Washington Post-University of Maryland Survey released in January, three years after the attack on the Capitol, shows that fewer Republicans now say the Jan. 6 protesters were "mostly violent" and that Trump is largely to blame for the riot when compared with a December 2021 survey. Just 14% of Republicans now say that Trump bears "a great deal" or "good amount" of blame for the attack, down from 27% in 2021, according to the Post.

The percentage of Republicans and independents who say punishments for Jan. 6 defendants have been "fair" or "not harsh enough" also has declined.

“There has definitely been serious movement from 2021 to 2023 when we did the two surveys, and so the question is: 'Is there still room for movement?' said Michael Hanmer, who directs the University of Maryland's Center for Democracy and Civic Engagement.

Based on Trump's pro-Jan.6 defendant actions, "I think the conclusion of their campaign would have to be yes," Hanmer added.

Yet Trump also risks turning off some GOP voters the more he "embraces the attack on the Capitol as a good thing,” Hanmer said.

“There’s a sizeable minority within the Republican Party that showed signs on a number of questions that they are uncomfortable with how things are going," Hanmer said. "I think it is a stretch in a lot of cases to suggest they might vote for Joe Biden but there’s a real chance it could influence their turnout decision."

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: What is J6 Prison Choir? Trump tries to rewrite history of Jan. 6