Edited by: TJVNews.com
This past week President Trump issued clemency in the form of pardons or commutations to more than 90 people, from relatively obscure white-collar or nonviolent drug offenders, according to a recent Yahoo News report
The Yahoo report indicated that in the days just before Christmas, Trump issued 45 pardons, including one to Charles Kushner, the father of Trump’s son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner, and to Trump’s own close associates Paul Manafort and Roger Stone, who had been convicted of crimes related to the 2016 campaign, leading to speculation that the pardons were a reward for their refusing to give evidence to investigators that could have implicated Trump. It is widely believed that Trump will issue more pardons before he leaves office on January 20th, including to family members who have not been charged with any crimes — or to himself.
Although a tremendous amount of scrutiny has been placed on the number and nature of the Trump pardons and commutations, the Pew Research organization has reported that “Donald Trump has used his clemency power less often than any president in modern history, according to data from the U.S. Department of Justice. Trump’s sparse use of pardons, commutations and other forms of official leniency stands in sharp contrast to his predecessor, Barack Obama, who used the clemency power more frequently than any chief executive since Harry Truman.”
Pew Research has reported that as of November 23rd, “Trump had granted clemency 44 times, including 28 pardons and 16 commutations. That’s the lowest total of any president since at least William McKinley, who served at the turn of the 20th century. Obama, by comparison, granted clemency 1,927 times during his eight-year tenure, including 212 pardons and 1,715 commutations. The only modern president who granted clemency almost as infrequently as Trump is George H.W. Bush, who granted 77 pardons and commutations in his single term.”
Trump has granted clemency to less than half of 1% of the more than 10,000 people who petitioned him for it through the end of the 2020 fiscal year (which ended Sept. 30), according to the Justice Department. That, too, is the lowest percentage of any president on record, though George W. Bush came close, granting clemency to just 2% of the more than 11,000 people who asked him for it during his eight years in office, according to the Pew Research report.
Pew Research reported that clemency refers to multiple forms of presidential mercy. The two most common forms are pardons, which forgive past crimes and restore civil rights, and commutations, which completely or partially reduce sentences for those in prison or on community supervision. Two less-common forms are remissions, which reduce financial penalties associated with convictions, and respites, which are temporary reprieves that are usually granted to inmates for medical reasons.
The Justice Department’s statistics, it’s important to note, do not count clemency granted through proclamation or executive order, such as the actions taken by Presidents Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter to forgive thousands of Vietnam-era draft dodgers, according to the Pew Research report. The DOJ numbers also count some clemency recipients twice – for example, in cases where someone received both a pardon and a commutation.
Of course, Trump has plenty of time left to exercise his pardon power, so a true comparison will have to wait till he leaves office.
