Trump pardons: 100 more to go

[brucejoel99]

In CNN's story yesterday it says the list "includes white collar criminals, high-profile rappers and others but -- as of now -- is not expected to include Trump himself."

Lil Wayne & Kodak Black, I presume.

[brucejoel99]

The number of arrests of Capitol rioters is like at 400 now, so if it's only 100 then it won't include them. I'm sure this is just a standard batch of cronies along with a few people actually deserving of it thrown in as a 0.

Unless it were to be a blanket pardon, of course.

[brucejoel99]

Am I right that it's somehow not illegal for him to sell pardons?

Both sides to a pay-for-pardons scheme could be subsequently prosecuted for bribery, but the pardons in question (for the buyers' original offenses) would remain fully valid.

[brucejoel99]

My suggestion is just that pardons and commutations are put on hold for 60 days or something (executions excepted) pending an optional review by Congress, whereby they can nullify by some large majority (2/3 rds?). This would leave the power open for any sane usage and avoid scenarios like pardoning every murderer for any crime they ever committed, and probably for less serious scenarios too like pardoning friends/family or other corrupt usage.

I've always found the pardon power to be grossly undemocratic and unbelievably ripe for abuse, and that was my view looong before trump. Instead of what you propose I've always thought that if someone truly deserved a pardon, the President could propose a pardon and both Houses of Congress would need something like 2/3 in favor for it to be approved (I'd settle for even a majority). In trump's case, this would have prevented all of his corrupt pardons to all his friends who colluded with Russians on his behalf and got caught, the murderer eddie gallagher, the blackwater butchers, etc.

Eh, as ripe for abuse as it has proven to be when bad actors come into play, the pardon power has always been one of the only avenues (&, sometimes, the LAST avenue) by which a wrongly convicted person can receive justice, or where a person given an unreasonably long prison sentence (often in cases of a defendant being "made an example of") can have their sentence mitigated. Congress being granted a sort-of "Congressional Review Act" but for pardons seems like a good idea in theory, 'til you remember that they're the ones who created the unjust sentencing laws in the first place, & them changing them for the better doesn't seem likely anytime soon. For a lot of people, the pardon power is (&, in all administrations but this one, has been) their only hope for justice.

[brucejoel99]

There's also a pardons megathread, BRTD, but we all know how much you love starting new threads for no reason.

Mods, please merge.

[brucejoel99]

https://twitter.com/kaitlancollins/status/1351738781490159618

[brucejoel99]

https://twitter.com/maggieNYT/status/1351755887090819073

[brucejoel99]

Bannon, Lil Wayne, and Kodak Black are the only ones I recognized.

Sholam Weiss, who was given the longest white-collar criminal sentence in U.S. history (835 years), has been commuted to time served after 19 years in prison, as has Kwame Kilpatrick, the former Mayor of Detroit sentenced to 28 years in federal prison for corruption back in 2013.

[brucejoel99]

I still find it baffling how there's been so little blowback over Trump pardoning corrupt machine politics democrats...

To be fair, massive blowback from NY Republicans is the sole reason that Sheldon Silver was removed from the list.