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- John Dean, who served as White House counsel under Nixon, blasted Trump for teasing a pardon for the Capitol rioters.
- Dean tweeted that Trump was going "beyond being a demagogue to the stuff of dictators."
- Prominent Republicans like Sen. Lindsey Graham have also opposed a pardon for the January 6 rioters.
John Dean, who served as White House counsel during Nixon's Watergate scandal, has disavowed Donald Trump's claim that he would consider pardoning the January 6 Capitol rioters if he were to win the presidency in 2024.
"If I run and if I win, we will treat those people from January 6 fairly. We will treat them fairly," Trump said at his "Save America" rally in Texas on Saturday. "And if it requires pardons, we will give them pardons. Because they are being treated so unfairly."
Dean, who was disbarred for obstruction of justice and held in government custody for four months during the Watergate scandal, tweeted his disagreement with Trump's promise of pardons.
"This is beyond being a demagogue to the stuff of dictators," Dean tweeted.
"He is defying the rule of law. Failure to confront a tyrant only encourages bad behavior," Dean added. "If thinking Americans don't understand what Trump is doing and what the criminal justice system must do, we are all in big trouble!"
Dean is among several prominent Republicans who have come out in opposition to Trump's potential plans to pardon the Capitol rioters.
Trump ally Lindsey Graham appeared on "Face the Nation" Sunday and said it was "inappropriate" for the former president to make such a suggestion.
"I don't want to send any signal that it was OK to defile the Capitol," Graham said. "There are other groups with causes that may want to go down the violent path if these people get pardoned."
"I think it's inappropriate. I don't want to reinforce that defiling the Capitol was OK. I don't want to do anything that would make this more likely in the future," Graham added.
Meanwhile, New Hampshire GOP Gov. Chris Sununu also broke with Trump, saying Sunday that the rioters should not be pardoned.
"Look, the folks that were part of the riots and, frankly, the assault on the US Capitol have to be held accountable," Sununu said during an interview on CNN's "State of the Union."
He added: "Everybody needs to be held fairly accountable across. That's part of leadership."
Police have charged 761 people for crimes related to the Capitol riot and at least 178 individuals have pleaded guilty to crimes in connection to the riot. Most recently, 11 members of the Oath Keepers militia were charged with seditious conspiracy in the Justice Department's investigation.
Before leaving office, Trump issued a generous list of 73 pardons and 70 commutations, including clemency for his former chief strategist Steve Bannon, former RNC finance chair Elliott Broidy, and rapper Lil Wayne. Trump also pardoned allies like Roger Stone, Paul Manafort, and George Papadopoulos.
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