Ryan Taylor Nichols of Longview, left, and Alex Kirk Harkrider of Carthage were serving federal prison sentences related to the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol riot before being pardoned Monday by President Donald Trump.

Two East Texas men are among about 1,500 defendants who have been pardoned by President Donald Trump of convictions or charges related to the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol.

Ryan Nichols of Longview was sentenced in May to 63 months in prison and three years of supervised release. Also in May, Alex Harkrider of Carthage was sentenced to 24 months in prison and two years of supervised release.

Federal prosecutors said the pair traveled together to Washington, D.C., in January 2021 based on their belief that the 2020 presidential election was stolen.

Neither man was listed Tuesday in the Federal Bureau of Prisons database.

Trump on Monday issued the pardons, fulfilling one of his campaign promises hours after he was sworn in as president.

He said that he would fully pardon almost all of the people involved in the riots, whose charges ranged from misdemeanor trespassing to assaulting police with weapons.

The Jan. 6 attack spurred the largest federal criminal investigation in U.S. history. Approximately 1,583 people were federally charged with participating in the attack, according to the government. More than 1,000 defendants pleaded guilty and more than 200 were convicted at trial.

There were more than 300 cases pending that hadn’t reached a verdict or plea deal.

Trump’s refusal to accept his 2020 election loss became a core part of his post-presidency political identity. He made the prospect of mass clemency for the people charged in connection with the Jan. 6 attack — which temporarily stopped Congress from certifying former President Joe Biden’s win — a prominent part of his reelection campaign.

Trump’s critics and former federal prosecutors denounced the prospect of sweeping pardons, warning it would normalize political violence. More than 140 police officers were assaulted, and rioters caused millions of dollars in damage to the Capitol building, according to the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington.

Sentences for the rioters have ranged from probation for people found guilty of misdemeanor crimes for illegally entering the Capitol to decades in prison for defendants convicted of violence or seditious conspiracy. Trials revealed that people brought guns, knives, chemical sprays, tasers and a variety of makeshift weapons to the Capitol.

On Monday, Trump said he’d also commute, or cut short the sentences, for six people, but didn’t immediately offer details.

There is precedent for large-scale presidential clemency. In December, Biden commuted the sentences of nearly 1,500 people who had been placed on home confinement during the pandemic. The late President Jimmy Carter signed a proclamation in 1977 pardoning Americans who avoided the military draft during the Vietnam War, although there was an exception for crimes involving “force or violence.”