Everyone remembers the shirtless, spear-wielding, horn-wearing man who quickly became the painted face of the Capitol riot. Honestly, it’s unlikely anyone will soon forget him, or the failed coup that President Biden branded “one of the darkest days in the history of our nation.”
The Arizona man’s legal name is Jacob Anthony Chansley, and he also goes by Jake Angeli, but most people know him better as the so-called “QAnon Shaman.”
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The 33-year-old is currently being held without bail while facing six federal charges, including entering a restricted building without lawful authority, violent entry, and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds.
Chansley had previously made a public plea for Trump to “do the honorable thing” and pardon him, along with the rest of his “peaceful followers” who also stormed the Capitol.
However, now that Trump is officially out of office and there’s no presidential pardon for him in sight, Chansley appears to have changed his tune and is now pushing the blame for the riots onto the former POTUS.
According to his attorney, Al Watkins, Chansley “accepted President Trump’s invitation to walk down Pennsylvania Avenue to the Capitol.”
“The request was of extraordinary value in that it accorded Trump an opportunity to do what his followers believed would have been the ‘honorable’ thing to do,” Watkins said, as per KMOV4 . “Mr. Chansley, along with many others who were similarly situated, are now compelled to reconcile a betrayal by a man whose back they felt they had for years.”
Chansley now regrets being “duped” by his commander-in-chief.
“He regrets very very much having not just been duped by the President, but by being in a position where he allowed that duping to put him in a position to make decisions he should not have made,” Watkins told KSDK .
In defense of his client’s actions, Watkins pointed to all of the false claims made by Trump ever since he lost the election to Biden in November.
As the attorney explained, Chansley was simply trying to do his part to right what he felt was a grave injustice.
“Let’s roll the tape,” Watkins said. “Let’s roll the months of lies, and misrepresentations and horrific innuendo and hyperbolic speech by our president designed to inflame, enrage, motivate. What’s really curious is the reality that our president, as a matter of public record, invited these individuals, as President, to walk down to the capitol with him.”
