Reporter Pleads Guilty to Jan. 6 Charges, Confident of a Pardon From Trump

Steve Baker, circled in yellow, in an image from video captured on Jan. 6, 2021. U.S. Department of Justice via The Epoch Times

A reporter on Nov. 12 pleaded guilty to four charges stemming from entering the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, as protesters and rioters interrupted the congressional certification of the 2020 election results.

Steve Baker of Blaze Media, which was founded by Glenn Beck after he left Fox News, pleaded guilty to entering and remaining in a restricted building, engaging in disorderly conduct with intent to impede government business, disturbing Congress, and parading in a Capitol building. Baker had previously pleaded not guilty to the four counts, all of which are misdemeanors.

Baker entered his guilty plea on the day that his bench trial had been scheduled to begin.

Baker, 64, of Durham, North Carolina, had asked U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper to postpone all of the deadlines and hearings for his case until after President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration. But Cooper denied his request. Other judges have rejected similar requests by Capitol breach defendants who hope Trump will pardon them.

After his guilty plea, Baker told reporters that he is “very confident that I’m at the top of the list” if Trump hands out pardons. Baker said he pleaded guilty “to avoid the shaming exercise of a trial” and maintained that he didn’t do anything wrong on Jan. 6.

Trump has said he would pardon some Jan. 6 defendants. A spokesperson for Trump’s transition team told The Epoch Times that Trump “will make pardon decisions on a case-by-case basis.”

Baker’s lawyer William Shipley wrote on the social media platform X: “Steve Baker admitted he went into the restricted area and inside the Capitol. He filmed himself and what he witnessed nearly every step along the way. Defending on the basis of the ‘facts’ of his conduct was not a viable alternative.”

Shipley added: “Steve did not want to sit through a public ’shaming session' where the Gov’t mischaracterized what he said at various points in time—he had political views like anyone else.”

According to an affidavit filed by the government, Baker said in a video that he went inside the office of then-U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). “They got Pelosi’s office and you know, it couldn’t happen to a better deserving [expletive]” he said in the video.

Law enforcement officials also said they reviewed footage Baker recorded of himself entering the Capitol at about 2:19 p.m. on Jan. 6, and walking around inside the building.

During an interview with a local broadcaster in Washington after Jan. 6, Baker said he was “quite excited” to see the breach. “Do I approve of what happened today? I approve 100 percent,” he said.

Cooper said during Tuesday’s hearing that he was troubled by Baker’s rhetoric.

“If you haven’t reassessed those comments, I’m not sure there’s anything I could say today that would change your mind,” the judge said.

More than 1,500 people have been charged with crimes related to Jan. 6. More than 1,000 convicted people have been sentenced, with more than 650 receiving prison time ranging from a few days to 22 years.

Cooper also pushed back against critics of the Jan. 6 prosecutions, saying cases have been decided by facts and evidence.

“They have not been governed by unsupported opinions and conspiracy theories,” the judge said.

Baker and his attorneys have accused the U.S. Department of Justice of selectively prosecuting him for his political beliefs. The judge rejected that claim, calling it “unfounded speculation.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.