Steve Baker, an opinion contributor for Blaze News and independent investigative journalist, said he pleaded guilty to four misdemeanor charges stemming from his presence at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, to avoid a “shaming exercise” of a trial by a liberal jury in a D.C. courtroom.
Baker, who is among a small group of journalists being prosecuted for being present at the Capitol on January 6, entered an Alfred plea to avoid a trial by jury in a Washington D.C. courtroom in front of U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper on Tuesday.
On Wednesday’s edition of The Michael Patrick Leahy Show, Baker said the “only” reason he entered the plea was due to the judge’s “100 percent conviction rate” regarding January 6 cases.
“I plead guilty for one reason only, and that was to avoid what one of my attorneys explained and rather accurately portrayed it as nothing more than a shaming exercise. In the D. C. District Court related to all of the January 6 cases, they have a 99.75 percent conviction rate on those cases and with my particular judge, it’s a 100 percent conviction rate,” Baker explained.
Baker, who is scheduled to be sentenced on March 6, 2025, said he is relying on President-elect Donald Trump to fulfill his campaign promise to pardon January 6 defendants once he enters the Oval Office in January.
“We believe that there’s pardons coming down the pike, and so my sentencing date was set for March 6th of 2025. That, of course, will be after the inauguration by a couple of weeks,” Baker said.
If not pardoned by Trump before his sentencing date, Baker explained that the judge could sentence him to prison for 12 months despite his charges only carrying sentences ranging from probation to up to 60 days.
“[The judge] does not like me and I gave him no reason to think otherwise yesterday in the courtroom. I angered him several times,” Baker said.
In the case he is sentenced to prison, Baker said he would be prepared.
“I’ve talked to guys that have done up to a year on their nonviolent J6 charges, guys that have done 6,7 months, guys that have done 30 days, 60 days. As painful as it is to think that I’m going to go through that or could go through that, the reality is unlike so many of these other people, my life has not been destroyed by this process. So many other people have lost their homes, they’ve lost their jobs, they’re literally not even able to get back into their careers because of the licenses they had that were taken away from them. They’ve lost their family members, their wives and children have denounced them. All manner of really painful things have happened. None of that has happened to me. I thank God for that,” Baker said.
“If I end up having to do 60 days in prison or something like that, then so be it. Steve Bannon just went through it, Pete Navarro just went through it, and so I’m not alone. It’s a small club, but it’s a growing club, unfortunately, in the government that we have today,” Baker added.
Despite facing prison time, Baker remains unintimidated and continues to work on reports about the January 6 protests at the Capitol.
Baker said he is currently working on a report that examines exactly how and who was behind the protests’ “spark.”
“We still have a lot of work to do yet on January 6,” Baker said.
Watch the full interview:
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Kaitlin Housler is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. Follow Kaitlin on X / Twitter.
Photo “Steve Baker” by Steve Baker.
