LI House reps, law enforcement advocates slam Trump’s Jan. 6 pardons

Daily Point

No one who attacks a police officer should be pardoned, they say

As the intense fallout continues nationally over President Donald Trump’s stunning decision Monday to grant clemency to more than 1,500 persons criminally convicted or charged for their roles in the riot at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 — including 132 who assaulted law enforcement officers — The Point noticed Wednesday morning that Long Island’s congressional delegation and top PBA officials had said little about it publicly.

So we asked.

Only CD3’s Tom Suozzi had any public response readily available midday, a two-minute video he shared before posting it later Wednesday. Suozzi said that while he wants to work with Trump on some issues, the pardoning of those who injured officers was a step too far, specifically calling out the case of Daniel Rodriquez who was sentenced to 12½ years in prison for beating an officer and then hitting him with a stun gun as he lay on the ground.

“They beat up cops here in DC on Jan. 6th,” Suozzi said.

He noted that in New York there is much criticism when perpetrators who assault police are released from jail. “Let’s have some consistency here, let’s not be hypocrites,” he said. “Let’s hold people accountable for the crimes they commit.”

Rep. Andrew Garbarino, who represents CD2, was pretty straightforward. “Every President has the authority to issue pardons as they see fit, and I won’t always agree with those decisions. In my opinion, anyone who assaults a cop should not be pardoned,” he told The Point in a statement.

CD4 freshman Laura Gillen’s spokeswoman sent a copy of a social media post that appeared late in the afternoon on the congresswoman’s X account. Gillen couched her criticism with a reference to the national police groups that had come out against the broad clemency Tuesday evening.

“Crimes against our law enforcement officers are not only crimes against the public servants who bravely serve and protect us but against the safety of our communities. I stand with the law enforcement community in opposing the dangerous precedent of pardoning those who beat, choked, and killed Capitol Police officers on January 6th.”

Here’s that joint statement from the Fraternal Order of Police and the International Association of Chiefs of Police, both of which endorsed Trump in his three presidential campaigns: “Allowing those convicted of these crimes to be released early diminishes accountability and devalues the sacrifices made by courageous law enforcement officers and their families” the unions wrote.

CD1 Rep. Nick LaLota, in response to our request, emailed a statement that denounced both former President Joe Biden’s pardons and those of Trump. “The pardons granted to President Biden’s family members and to individuals convicted of violent felonies for January 6th erode accountability and weaken the integrity of our justice system,” he said.

Suffolk PBA president Lou Civello took the same approach in a statement, saying the preemptive pardons given by Biden to his family “were almost as bad” as Trump’s actions and both had to be considered in that light. But then he got to the matter at hand. “Our justice system must remain impartial and pardons should only be given in cases that address injustices, foster unity and promote the values of democracy. While it may be appropriate to consider pardons for some, no one who attacks a police officer should ever receive one.”

— Rita Ciolli rita.ciolli@newsday.com

Pencil Point

Unpardonable

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Data Point

Public transit use on LI down since pandemic, data shows

Like the rest of the nation, public transit ridership on Long Island dropped with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Now we know how much.

Recently released data from the U.S. Census Bureau showed a 24.7% drop from 2018 to 2023 in the number of Nassau County residents taking public transportation to work. In Suffolk County, the decline during the same period was 14.4%. The Census Bureau’s American Community Survey measures average characteristics across five-year periods.

An estimated 13% of Nassau’s working residents age 16 and older, or about 88,800 individuals, told the ACS they used public transportation to commute to work in 2023. In Suffolk County, an estimated 40,200 people, or about 5.2% of its workers, said they relied on public transportation to commute. This includes the Long Island Rail Road, the Nassau Inter-County Express bus service, and Suffolk County Transit. It does not include taxicabs or services such as Uber and Lyft.

Driving alone in a car is still the dominant way to commute in the suburbs. In 2023, an estimated 62.2% of Nassau’s working residents, or 424,300 people, said they drove alone to work, while roughly 73% of Suffolk’s workers, or 564,100 people, drove alone.

However, this is a decline from 2018, when 67% of Nassau’s workers and 80% of Suffolk’s said they drove alone to work, since a larger share of residents have been working from home since the pandemic.

Despite increasing traffic on Long Island roads, as The Point previously reported, the mean travel time to work for those driving largely remained unchanged between 2018 and 2023 at 30 minutes for Nassau residents and 29 minutes for Suffolk residents. About 53% of workers in Nassau and about 45% in Suffolk said they spent more than 30 minutes traveling to work in 2023.

Since 2020, the Census Bureau has been measuring ‘telework,’ or work from home status of survey respondents. ACS data shows that in 2023, an estimated 13.8% or 94,500 of employed residents in Nassau worked from home, and an estimated 10.7% or about 82,000 of Suffolk’s employed residents worked from home.

— Karthika Namboothiri karthika.namboothiri@newsday.com

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