section_path: Comparisons/Political violence/January 6 attack
section_name: January 6 attack
paragraph_text: January 6 attack
  
  The attack on the United States Capitol by supporters of Donald Trump on January 6, 2021, has been compared by some academics to the Beer Hall Putsch, a failed coup attempt in Germany by Nazi Party leader Adolf Hitler against the Weimar government in 1923.
  
  Anatomy of Fascism author Robert Paxton, a political scientist and historian specializing in the study of fascism, previously denied that Trump should be labeled a fascist but changed his views following the January 6 attack. Paxton saw the attack on the capitol as similar to both Mussolini's 1922 march on Rome, in which his blackshirts successfully took over Italy's capital, and the 1934 far-right anti-parliamentary riot in Paris; however, he also believes that "the word fascism has been debased into epithet, making it a less and less useful tool for analyzing political movements of our times". In 2024, Historian Ruth Ben-Ghiat wrote in that, just as Mussolini eventually pardoned the blackshirts who helped him ascend to power, "Trump has also already vowed to pardon" his supporters who were convicted of crimes related to January 6. In 2025, Trump pardoned every January 6 Capitol rioter, including those who assaulted police officers and defendants with domestic violence, manslaughter, " production of child sexual abuse material ", rape, and child sexual abuse on their criminal records.