A New York man whom President Donald Trump pardoned of crimes related to the Jan. 6, 2021, U.S. Capitol riot is behind bars again after allegedly threatening to kill a top House Democrat.
Authorities arrested 34-year-old Christopher Moynihan of Clinton, New York, on Sunday on a felony charge of making a terroristic threat against House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York, according to the New York State Police (NYSP), jail records and a report by CBS News. Moynihan was among a crowd that “broke through” a police line into the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., to protest the certification of former President Joe Biden’s electoral win and was sentenced to 21 months in prison in 2023 before Trump pardoned around 1,500 Jan. 6 defendants. (RELATED: DOJ Charges Suspect With Sending Death Threat To Benny Johnson)
Christopher Moynihan poses for mug shots after his arrest on Oct. 19, 2025, at the Dutchess County Jail in Dutchess County, New York. (Image courtesy of Dutchess County Jail)
Moynihan wrote in text messages that Jeffries was making a speech in New York City on Monday and that he “cannot allow this terrorist to live,” court documents allege, according to CBS News. “Even if I am hated, he must be eliminated, I will kill him for the future,” Moynihan allegedly wrote. The FBI tipped off the NYSP about the alleged threat on Saturday, the agency said.
The Daily Caller News Foundation could not identify an attorney for Moynihan. The NYSP did not provide further case information to the DCNF, saying it would not release “details pertaining to the member of Congress.”
The arrest came approximately one year and seven months after Moynihan was released from federal custody in his Jan. 6 case. Moynihan walked with other protesters through the Capitol building after they breached the security perimeter, shuffled through a senator’s notebook, and took pictures, saying, “There’s gotta be something in here we can fucking use against these scumbags,” court documents show. He pleaded guilty in federal court to obstruction of an official proceeding and several misdemeanors.
The White House did not respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.
Conservatives criticized the Biden administration’s Jan. 6 prosecutions and sentences as excessive, given that many protesters were nonviolent. The Supreme Court also sided with some Jan. 6 defendants in June 2024, ruling that the DOJ stretched the meaning of the obstruction of an official proceeding charge to make protesters into felons.
Some federal agents also expressed in internal assessments that the Capitol riot investigation was politically motivated, according to an FBI report the Trump administration released to Congress. Officials deployed more than 270 FBI agents onto the scene with no clear instructions that day, the report found.
“What they’ve done to these people is outrageous,” Trump said on his first day back in office when announcing his Jan. 6 pardons. “We hope they come out tonight. Frankly, they’re expecting it.” The president commuted the sentences of 14 remaining defendants without pardoning them.
Moynihan’s case underscores rising political violence and threats against political figures in the wake of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk’s Sept. 10 assassination in Utah. Federal prosecutors also announced charges on Oct. 10 against a man for allegedly sending death threats to conservative social media influencer Benny Johnson around Sept. 18.
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