President Donald Trump declared a national emergency at the southern border and pardoned approximately 1,500 Jan. 6 rioters during his first few executive orders in his return to the Oval Office on Monday (January 20), ABC News reports.
The pardon also included six commutations, according to the president.
"We hope they come out tonight. Frankly, they're expecting it," Trump told reporters ahead of the inaugural Starlight Ball.
Last month, Trump pledged to carry out “the largest deportation operation in American history” upon taking office.
“On my first day back in the Oval Office, I will sign a historic slate of executive orders to close our border to illegal aliens and stop the invasion of our country,” Trump said while speaking at Turning Point Action’s AmericaFest conference in Arizona on December 22.
Trump, 78, made illegal immigration a key talking point during his successful re-election campaign and announced that his former acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement director Tom Homan would serve as "border czar" for his new administration in a post shared on his Truth Social account on November 10.
Trump also previously told Meet the Press' Kristen Welker that he planned to pardon January 6 protesters during his first day back in the White House, claiming the January 6 committee in Congress belonged in jail instead.
"I’m going to look at everything. We’ll look at individual cases," Trump said in December. "But I’m going to be acting very quickly."