President Trump embarked on a pardoning spree Wednesday, granting clemency to nine individuals, including a former congressman and three-term Connecticut governor, and commuted the sentence of three more people, including a Chicago gang leader.
The pardons, which were confirmed by a senior White House official, brings the total number of clemency actions by Mr. Trump this week to 12.
Mr. Trump’s pardons and commutations coincide with the installation of Ed Martin as the Justice Department’s new pardon attorney.
Mr. Martin was appointed to the position after his nomination to serve as the U.S. Attorney for Washington, D.C., was sunk by Republicans who expressed concern about his defense of Jan. 6 Capitol rioters.
Since joining the Justice Department, Mr. Martin has been aggressively looking into several politically charged cases for potential pardons.
Others who received clemency had been backed by Alice Marie Johnson, who Mr. Trump has dubbed his “pardon czar.” Ms. Johnson has also advocated for Kentrell Gaulden, Earl Lamont Smith, Annabelle Valenzuela and Maryanne Morgan.
SEE ALSO: Trump says convictions in Whitmer kidnap plot were ‘railroad job,’ floats pardon
On Wednesday, the president pardoned Mr. Smith and commuted the sentences of Ms. Valenzuela and Ms. Morgan.
“Big thanks to the Pardon Czar, Ms. Alice Marie Johnson, for fighting for second chances for so many people,” Mr. Gaulden said in a statement.
Mr. Gaulden, known as YoungBoy Never Broke Again or NBA YoungBoy, was in jail for firearm charges. He was set to be released in July after taking a plea deal.
Almost all of the clemency recipients share one common thread, they are vocal Trump supporters.
For example, Savannah Chrisley, the daughter of Todd and Julie Chrisley, who was pardoned Tuesday, spoke at the Republican National Convention last year. During her remarks, she claimed her parents had been persecuted for their political beliefs.
Mr. Trump pardoned the reality TV stars known for “Chrisley Knows Best,” who were found guilty in 2022 of conspiring to defraud community banks out of more than $30 million of fraudulent loans and of tax evasion for hiding their earnings.
Todd was sentenced to 12 years in prison and Julie was sentenced to seven years. They were also ordered to pay $17.8 million in restitution.
Sheriff Scott Howard Jenkins of Culpeper County, Virginia, had railed against his conviction and 10-year prison sentence for accepting over $75,000 in bribes was the work of a weaponized justice system under former President Biden.
The sheriff is also an outspoken backer of the president and his pardon was hailed by Mr. Martin in an X post that said, “No MAGA left behind.”
Mark Bashaw, a former Army lieutenant, was court-martialed during the Biden administration for refusing to comply with military COVID-19 practices such as receiving the vaccine and wearing a mask.
He was discharged from the Army after his 2022 conviction, which Mr. Trump pardoned Wednesday.
“I got court-martialed because I refused to participate in their lies,” Mr. Bashaw wrote on X after his conviction.
The slew of clemency actions has generated criticism from Democrats as well as some Republicans.
Marc Short, a conservative commentator who served as former Vice President Mike Pence’s chief of staff, blasted Mr. Trump’s pardon policy in an interview with CNN on Tuesday.
“I have no interest in defending his pardon policy. I think it’s been pretty gross,” Mr. Short said of Mr. Trump’s pardons.
Senate Minority Whip Richard J. Durbin, Illinois Democrat and ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, criticized the pardons as an “ethical, legal and moral disaster.”
“There are Justice Department guidelines to be considered with pardon petitions, but the Trump Administration’s new ‘guidelines’ are clear when Ed Martin tweets, ‘No MAGA left behind.’ Is this what Donald Trump meant when he promised to end the weaponization of the federal government,” he said in a statement.
But Trump defenders have pointed to Mr. Biden, who issued a slew of controversial clemency actions before leaving office in January.
Mr. Biden issued a blanket pardon to his son Hunter Biden, who was convicted of three federal gun crimes and pleaded guilty to failing to pay $1.4 million in taxes.
He later commuted the sentences of nearly 1,500 people, including a woman who killed two of her ex-husbands and another lover; a woman who stole $54 million from a small town in Illinois and a Pennsylvania judge who sentenced minors to harsh prison sentences for petty crimes in exchange for kickbacks from the prison operators.
Mr. Biden also issued preemptive pardons for members of his family, COVID-19 response chief Anthony Fauci, and lawmakers on the House committee that investigated the Jan. 6 attack.
Critics have little power to respond to Mr. Trump’s pardons, other than publicly griping about them.
A president’s pardon power is broad and absolute and clearly spelled out in the Constitution. Changing it would require a constitutional amendment, which would be extremely difficult to achieve at all and impossible to do so quickly.
On Wednesday, Mr. Trump signaled more pardons could be coming.
He told reporters in the Oval Office that he will “take a look” at the case of two men convicted of plotting to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat.
Mr. Trump pledged to review and suggested that the two defendants may have been set up.
“I did watch the trial. It looked to me like somewhat of a railroad job,” he said. “I’ll be honest with you, it looked to me like some people said some stupid things. You know, they were drinking and I think they said stupid things.”
Earlier this week, Mr. Trump pardoned James Callahan, general president of the International Union of Operating Engineers, who pleaded guilty to failing to report gifts. He was pardoned ahead of his sentencing.
On Wednesday, the president also pardoned:
• Michael Grimm, former Republican congressman for New York who was convicted in late 2014 of tax fraud and related charges. He resigned from Congress early 2015 and was sentenced to eight months in prison, but served seven.
• John Rowland, former Republican governor of Connecticut who pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit honest services mail fraud and tax fraud and was sentenced to 30 months in prison in 2015 for illegal involvement in two congressional campaigns.
• Mr. Smith, who spent 15 months in jail after being convicted of selling surplus government computers they fraudulently obtained through a federal program.
• John Moore Jr. and Tanner Mansell, who were convicted in 2022 for the theft of commercial fishing gear in federal waters in Florida.
On Wednesday, the president commuted the sentence of Larry Hoover, former Chicago gang leader who was imprisoned in the 1970s for a murder and later convicted of running a criminal enterprise in 1998. He was serving six life sentences.
• Jeff Mordock can be reached at jmordock@washingtontimes.com.
• Mallory Wilson can be reached at mwilson@washingtontimes.com.