A federal judge on Monday questioned why U.S. prosecutors are asking Capitol riot defendants to pay only $1.5 million in restitution while American taxpayers are paying more than $500 million to cover the costs of the Jan. 6 attack by a pro-Trump mob.

Chief U.S. District Judge Beryl A. Howell of Washington challenged the toughness of the Justice Department’s stance in a plea hearing for a Colorado Springs man who admitted to one of four nonviolent misdemeanor counts of picketing in the U.S. Capitol.

Howell has already asked in another defendant’s plea hearing whether no-prison misdemeanor plea deals offered by the government are too lenient for individuals involved in “terrorizing members of Congress,” asking pointedly whether the government had “any concern about deterrence?”

On Monday, she pressed the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington on why it was seeking to require only $2,000 in each felony case and $500 in each misdemeanor case.