Mark McCloskey was a featured speaker at the Republican Women of Newton County and the Newton County Republican Central Committee’s Annual Free Watermelon Seed in Neosho when he learned that Gov. Mike Parson had pardoned him and his wife of all gun charges related to an incident last summer involving a Black Lives Matter protest.
“We were doing a function in front of 360 people and having a great time at the event and that phone call just put the cherry on top of my day,” McCloskey told the St. Louis Record. “The governor had always told us he was going to do it, and I knew he would so I wasn't surprised but it's always a good thing when good things happen.”
Former President Donald Trump praised Parson for the pardon, according to media reports.
“Congratulations to Governor Mike Parson of Missouri for having the courage to give Mr. and Mrs. Mark McCloskey a full pardon,” Trump wrote in a statement online. “They were defending their property and if they had not done what they did, their property would have been completely destroyed and they would have been badly beaten, or dead—great going Mike!”
Mark McCloskey, 63, and Patricia McCloskey, 61, gained national attention a year ago in the wake of the George Floyd controversy for brandishing firearms in front of their Central West End home while Black Lives Matter demonstrators marched towards former Mayor Lyda Krewson’s nearby home.
“It's nice to be able to move forward with a clean record,” McCloskey said. “A quirk in Missouri law did not allow the governor to pardon us until we had actually been convicted of something. Part of the decision to plead to the class C misdemeanors was that it then gave the governor a vehicle through which he could issue his pardon.”
McCloskey pleaded guilty to fourth-degree assault, a misdemeanor, and surrendered the firearms but has petitioned to reclaim them and to have the fines he paid refunded.
Maximum fines for the McCloskeys combined were $2,750.
“If the governor has wiped clean the record, then they've got no right to my money and they've got no right to my two guns used in that incident,” McCloskey said.
As previously reported, the pair acquired a new AR-15 just before being pardoned on July 30.
McCloskey has since announced his candidacy for the Senate seat being vacated by Sen. Roy Blunt in the 2022 election, which pits McCloskey against other Republican contenders including former Gov. Eric Greitens, Attorney General Eric Schmitt, and Congresswoman Vicky Hartzler.
“We need every dollar we can get because the Left and Republican In Name Only (RINO)s are coming to get us,” he added. “I constantly hear rumors of the big lie that I used to be a Democrat. I've even heard people are spreading rumors amongst Republican central committees in different states that I was a supporter of Black Lives Matter. We're getting lots of fake news and we’re fighting back.”