Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican from South Carolina, said on Sunday it was a “mistake” to pardon or commute the sentences of “people who went into the Capitol and beat up a police officer violently”.

At least 600 rioters were charged with assaulting or obstructing law enforcement officers in connection with the attack at the US Capitol.

Vice-president JD Vance defended the pardons on Sunday, saying Trump had “made the right decision”.

It was a reversal for Vance, who said two weeks ago that “if you committed violence on that day, obviously you shouldn’t be pardoned”.

The shift reflects a wider dilemma for Republican lawmakers brought by the executive order: Either defend the pardons – which appear unpopular with voters – or oppose them and potentially face Trump’s ire.

A recent Associated Press survey suggests that only two in 10 Americans approve of pardoning most of those involved in the attack.

Graham acknowledged that the president “has that power” in an interview with CNN on Sunday, but he said he did not approve of its use by Trump or his predecessor – Joe Biden.

Just before leaving office last week, the former president pardoned members of his own family and an indigenous-rights activist who was involved in a shootout that killed two FBI agents.

“I don’t like it on either side, and I don’t think the public likes it, either,” he told CNN.

Graham said he had spoken to Trump about the order and suggested that Congress may have to review the presidential pardon power in general.

Earlier in Trump’s first week, Republicans such as Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski and former Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell expressed their displeasure over the president’s order.

Still, other Republicans have come to Trump’s defence.

“The president’s made his decision. I don’t second-guess those,” House Speaker Mike Johnson said this week.

“It’s kind of my ethos, my worldview: We believe in redemption. We believe in second chances,” Johnson added. “You could argue that those people didn’t pay that heavy penalty, having been incarcerated and all of that. That’s up to you. But the president’s made a decision. We move forward.”

And on Sunday, Vice-President Vance told Margaret Brennan of CBS, the BBC’s US partner, that Trump made the right decision pardoning and commuting the sentences of the rioters.

“We looked at 1,600 cases and the thing that came out of it… is that there was a massive denial of due process of liberty, and a lot of people were denied their constitutional rights,” Vance said, adding that the Department of Justice’s prosecution of the rioters was “politically motivated”.

“The president believes that. I believe that and I think he made the right decision,” he said. “We rectified a wrong and I stand by it”.

Republicans, such as Senate majority leader John Thune and House Speaker Mike Johnson, have sidestepped discussing Trump’s Capitol riot order by maintaining that their focus is on the country’s future.

Meanwhile, Trump’s decision has not sat well with Democrats.

A group of Senate lawmakers on Monday will seek to pass a resolution that formally condemns the pardons of rioters convicted of assaulting police officers on the day of the Capitol attack, according to reporting from CBS News, the BBC’s US partner.

“I refuse to allow President Trump to rewrite what happened on January 6 – armed insurrectionists, incited by Trump himself, broke into the U.S. Capitol and violently assaulted Capitol Police officers in their attempt to overthrow a free and fair election,” said Senator Patty Murray, a Democrat from Washington state.

The resolution is unlikely to pass in the Republican-controlled Senate, but it could force lawmakers to take a public position on Trump’s decision.

Most members of the president’s party have been pleased with Trump’s ambition to fulfill a long list of his campaign promises quickly by signing hundreds of execution actions.

In many instances, these actions reversed Biden-administration policies.

Trump halted foreign aid as part of his “America-First” foreign policy agenda, rescinded sanctions on extremist Israeli settlers and revoked a mandate that federal workers must be vaccinated against Covid.

“He’s not sitting in the Oval Office doing nothing,” Vance told CBS. “He’s doing the American people’s business, and I think they’re going to see a lot of good effects from it.”

Vance called it “an incredible breakneck pace of activity”.

“I think the president is to be commended for actually coming in and doing something with this incredible mandate the American people gave him,” he added.

Pamela Hemphill, who pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 60 days in prison, told the BBC that there should be no pardons for the riot on 6 January 2021.

“Accepting a pardon would only insult the Capitol police officers, rule of law and, of course, our nation,” she said.

“I pleaded guilty because I was guilty, and accepting a pardon also would serve to contribute to their gaslighting and false narrative.”

Hemphill, who was nicknamed the “Maga granny” by social media users – in reference to Trump’s “make America great again” slogan – said she saw the Trump government as trying to “rewrite history and I don’t want to be part of that”.

“We were wrong that day, we broke the law – there should be no pardons,” she told the BBC World Service’s Newsday programme.

Trump’s decision to pardon or commute the sentences of nearly 1,600 people involved in the attempt to violently overturn the 2020 election came just hours into his presidency.

In a news conference on Tuesday at the White House, he said: “These people have already served years in prison, and they’ve served them viciously.

“It’s a disgusting prison. It’s been horrible. It’s inhumane. It’s been a terrible, terrible thing.”

However, the move has drawn an uneasy reaction from some Republican politicians.

Senator Thom Tillis, from North Carolina, said he “just can’t agree” with the move, adding that it “raises legitimate safety issues on Capitol Hill”.

Another Republican US senator, James Lankford from Oklahoma, told CNN: “I think we need to continue to say we are a party of law and order.”

He added: “I think if you attack a police officer, that’s a very serious issue and they should pay a price for that.”

Also among those pardoned was one of the riot’s most recognisable figures, Jacob Chansley, the self-styled QAnon Shaman, who was released from jail in 2023 after serving 27 months of his 41-month jail sentence.

He told the BBC that he heard the news from his lawyer while he was at the gym.

He added: “I walked outside and I screamed ‘freedom’ at the top of my lungs and then gave a good Native American war cry.”