More than 50 Donald Trump supporters from Illinois will get their federal rap sheets wiped clean after the new president’s Day 1 signing of about 1,500 pardons related to the notorious riot at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

Dozens of Trump’s supporters from the Chicago area and other parts of the state ended up in the dragnet during the U.S. Justice Department’s enormous, four-year investigation into the failed effort to overturn Trump’s defeat in the 2020 election.

A Chicago Sun-Times review of federal court records found 43 of the 53 defendants from Illinois had been convicted and sentenced in cases stemming from the Capitol insurrection by the time Trump took office Monday and carried out his campaign promise to help people he described as “hostages” of politicized federal law-enforcement.

The lawyer for one of the defendants — former Chicago Police Officer Karol J. Chwiesiuk — welcomed Trump’s decision as “the right thing to do.”

“It was a witch hunt,” the lawyer, Nishay Sanan of Chicago, said of the Jan. 6 cases. “This was the Democrats’ attempt to go after Trump and his supporters. Why didn’t anyone go after the people who burned down Portland and Minneapolis? Because they’re all Democrats.”

Kevin J. Lyons of Inverness — who received one of the longest prison sentences among the Illinois defendants, at 51 months — replied to a request for comment from a reporter Monday evening with a profanity.

According to court records, Lyons wrongly entered the Capitol and took a photo of a plaque outside then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office. He was found guilty of all the charges lodged against him, although a judge later tossed a count of obstruction of an official proceeding following the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Fischer v. United States.

Lyons was released from prison last August, records show.

“Go f— yourself,” he told a reporter via text message.

Trump commuted the sentences of 14 Jan. 6 defendants, including Enrique Tarrio, the leader of the far-right Proud Boys militia, and Stewart Rhodes, founder of the anti-government Oath Keepers.

According to the “proclamation” on Monday from Trump, he had acted to “grant a full, complete and unconditional pardon to all other individuals convicted of offenses related to events that occurred at or near the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021.” And he also ordered his new attorney general to drop all pending cases.

The Jan. 6 convicts from Illinois came from all over the state and also included a retired Chicago firefighter and a onetime CEO from the northwest suburbs.

Chwiesiuk’s lawyer, Sanan, said he hoped his client now could be reinstated as a Chicago cop and he bemoaned how then-Mayor Lori Lightfoot and police leadership in the Democratic-dominated city “made a mockery of Karol” when he was arrested and charged for going to Washington four years ago.

Sanan also represented other Jan. 6 defendants from Illinois, including Chwiesiuk’s sister and Robert Giacchetti of Crystal Lake. Giacchetti used his body to push against a law enforcement officer, then broke equipment owned by the Associated Press and pushed over a camera and tripod, striking a journalist.

He pleaded guilty to a count of assaulting, resisting or impeding certain officers. His sentencing had been set for June.

In another highly publicized case, retired firefighter Joseph Pavlik joined rioters who spent more than two hours assaulting officers in an area of the Capitol known as “The Tunnel” and was sentenced to two months in prison.

The first person from the Chicago area who faced federal charges was former CEO Bradley Rukstales of Inverness, who pleaded guilty to parading, demonstrating or picketing inside a Capitol building and was sentenced to 30 days in jail. Rukstales admitted that he threw a chair in the direction of officers who had previously retreated and formed a defensive line.

Rukstales did not return messages but on X on Sunday, he posted that a presidential pardon would represent a “righteous gift” to him, and recently he expressed hope that he and other “J6ers” would receive reparations.

Tom Schuba is a reporter and editor covering criminal justice issues for the Sun-Times. Dan Mihalopoulos is an investigative reporter for WBEZ. Jon Seidel writes about federal courts and legal affairs for the Sun-Times.

Every state in the nation has some sort of concealed carry law. The requirements vary state by state. Some allow concealed carry without a permit. Other states like Illinois require a permit. Illinois was the last state in the nation to implement a law allowing carrying concealed firearms outside the home in 2013.

U.S. Lawshield’s Kirk Evans said national concealed carry reciprocity would be similar to how states recognize driver’s licenses from other states.

“But the general concept is if you’ve got a concealed carry permit in, say, Virginia, then Illinois is going to be required to recognize that permit,” Evans told The Center Square.

In 2018, gun control advocates Everytown posted on Twitter, now X, that “’Concealed Carry Reciprocity’ would force every state to accept other states’ concealed carry standards, even states that have weaker standards, or, worse, no standards at all,” and “would undermine the standards that states have set for who can carry hidden, loaded guns in public.”

With Illinois’ firearms regulations among the most strict in the nation, Evans expects some to be “kicking and screaming” from gun control groups in Illinois if national reciprocity is enacted.

“The better news for Illinois is while you have to recognize that permit, you can still regulate the how, where and why of carrying,” Evans said.

Bills filed in the U.S. House and Senate have been endorsed by the National Rifle Association, U.S. Concealed Carry Association, National Shooting Sports Foundation and Gun Owners of America.

Maxon Shooter’s Supplies owner Dan Eldridge said a national concealed carry reciprocity law could increase tourism to Chicago and elsewhere.

“If indeed there is national reciprocity, I think there would be a boom in gun tourism in New York and Chicago,” Eldridge told The Center Square. “People that otherwise wouldn’t come here will.”

But, Evans said if a reciprocity law were enacted, there would still be carve outs for any so-called “sensitive places” states could restrict concealed firearms.

“That part is extraordinarily difficult when you’ve got these ongoing legal battles to figure out what the status is in any given second,” Evans said.

In Illinois, concealed carry is prohibited on mass transit. That law was found to be unconstitutional by a federal judge in the Northern District of Illinois in October, but the ruling only impacts the plaintiffs that sued the state. Benjamin Schoenthal, et al v. Eileen O’Neill Burke is pending in the Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.

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In November, President-elect Donald Trump announced he would sign a concealed carry reciprocity bill into law. The bill is expected to pass Congress. After Trump signs it into law, it would go into effect within 90 days, according to the bill language.

No one can deny that No. 19 Illinois and No. 12 Michigan State waged an epic battle Sunday when the Illini visited the Breslin Center in East Lansing, where the Spartans came away battered and perhaps a bit bruised but with an 80-78 win – their 11th victory in a row.

Beyond that, fans of the Illini (13-5, 5-3 Big Ten) and Spartans (16-2, 7-0) could find very little common ground in their assessment of the matchup – especially given how pivotal the officials’ calls were in such a tightly contested affair.

With many Illini fans bemoaning the officiating in Illinois’ sixth loss in its past seven visits to the Breslin Center and Spartans fans accusing their orange-and-blue-backing counterparts of excessive whining, the most objective and sober judgments on social media came from the press and other unbiased sources. (Even if the funniest came from elsewhere.)

Let’s take a quick look at the best and most significant reactions to the Illinois-Michigan State game, starting with a couple of alums:

Several prominent members of the college basketball media weighed in on the Illini during and after the game, unable to help noticing the Illini’s grit – and perhaps the seeds of potential greatness:

CBS Sports’ Jon Rothstein deserves his own special shout-out after serving up volume, analysis and humor in a series of posts:

Then you have the sharp, the voice and the former coach, all of them with unique perspectives on what they saw on the floor at the Breslin Center on Sunday:

And this one? Well, we just couldn’t get away with running a social-media reaction story and not including this post:

Michigan State Outlasts Illinois Basketball in Big Ten Slugfest

Michigan State’s Tom Izzo Compares Illinois Basketball to ‘Celtics or Lakers’

Illinois Basketball Makes Significant Moves in NET, KenPom Rankings