U.S. President Donald Trump reacts as he and Canada's Prime Minister Mark Carney (not pictured) meet in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., October 7, 2025. REUTERSEvelyn Hockstein
President Donald Trump is exhibiting a pattern of leniency toward domestic terrorists who believe in far-right causes, according to one of his former staffers.
During a Wednesday segment on MSNBC, Miles Taylor — who was chief of staff in the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) during Trump's first term – commented on the Trump administration's recent suspension of two Department of Justice prosecutors who sought to sentence Taylor Taranto, a pardoned January 6 rioter found guilty of weapons charges and other crimes earlier this year. He argued that the harsh treatment of federal prosecutors for simply doing their jobs was part of Trump's agenda of looking after people who share his political values — no matter their crimes.
"Donald Trump is coddlingassassins because he can," Taylor said. "... They are coddling theseassassins because they don'tworry about any implications ofgiving a pass to these people."
Taylor brought up the fact that one of the participants in the January 6 attack on the Capitol was recently charged with trying to assassinate House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), and connected that to the punishment of the prosecutors who tried to sentence Taranto. He also observed that he routinely ran into obstacles during Trump's first term when trying to get the DHS to focus on far-right domestic terrorism.
"The FBI and our agentsat DHS were telling us therewas a spike in domestic violentextremism. And primarily it wascoming from the right," Taylor said. "... They told us and they toldthe White House, there is agrowing right-wing extremistmovement. And you know what theresponse was? We're not goingto talk about that in thenational counterterrorismstrategy. They didn't want totalk about it unless it wascoming from the left."
Taylor also cautioned that Trump's talk of pursuing a third term in office should be taken seriously, and said Americans need only look to Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor's dissent in the Trump v. United States case that gave him absolute criminal immunity for "official acts" as evidence that Trump believes he can ignore the law in order to remain in the White House.
"The president's not joking whenhe says he wants to staypresident of the United States.And scenarios like the justicelaid out there are verycredible," he said. "If past is prologue, weknow Donald Trump is willing toabrogate the Constitution, tohold on to power."
Watch the segment below:
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