We post news and comment on federal criminal justice issues, focused primarily on trial and post-conviction matters, legislative initiatives, and sentencing issues.

TRUMP DOES SOMETHING RIGHT(?)

After all of the angst since November about a flurry of pardons and commutations to be issued by President Donald John Trump (and you cannot imagine my relief at knowing I will never have to type those words again) – including speculation that he would pardon his family, all of his close friends, the Capitol rioters and even himself – Trump issued the final long-awaited clemency list in the wee hours on his last day in office (and you cannot imagine my relief at typing those words).

The media predictably fixated on the of handful of longtime allies and well-connected celebrities, including his former chief strategist, Steve Bannon, and onetime fundraiser Elliott Broidy, on the list. But that should not obscure the fact that, in virtually his last exercise of Presidential power, Trump pretty much got it right.

The White House released the list of 143 pardons and commutations at 12:50 a.m., as – according to the Wall Street Journal – Trump’s deliberations over who should receive clemency stretched late into the last full day of his term. Bannon, much like Schroedinger’s cat, flitted onto and off of the pardon list, but finally was included, short-circuiting his federal trial scheduled for May. A few rappers, politicos and Trump loyalists made the list, but the real story was that 90% of those getting pardons and commutations were rather ordinary people.

Only 18 of those on the list – 13% – were supported by the Dept of Justice Office of Pardon Attorney. The balance were by an array of political leaders, criminal justice reformers and other allies of the president.

On Tuesday, the president was still calling advisers to ask them how he should proceed on certain pardons and waffled repeatedly over whether to grant one to Mr. Bannon, a person familiar with the conversations said.

At various points on Tuesday, advisers believed Mr. Bannon—who was charged in connection to a scheme to siphon money from a crowdfunding campaign for a border wall—wouldn’t get one. The White House in a statement said Mr. Bannon “has been an important leader in the conservative movement and is known for his political acumen.”

Don’t take my word for it: here’s the list of those pardoned (their crimes forgiven) or had sentences commuted (imprisonment reduced or terminated, but the conviction remains):

White House List

Trump has been widely criticized for using his clemency power to favor celebrities and political allies, including Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort, Roger Stone and former Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio. But he was praised for commuting the sentences of some prisoners serving long sentences for nonviolent drug offenses, like 63-year old Alice Johnson, who was doing life for a 1996 crack conspiracy. Her story (she was hardly the kingpin, but paid the price for not taking a deal) caught the attention of reality-TV star Kim Kardashian, who convinced Trump to commute her sentence. The move paid off for Trump: Johnson was a vocal supporter of the President after that (who could blame her), even speaking at the Republican convention last summer. Trump rewarded that by upgrading her commutation to a pardon. At the same time, Johnson advocated for clemency for people she knew in the system.

Before last week, Trump had pardoned or commuted the sentences of 44 people convicted of federal crimes —far fewer than any other president. To be sure, Trump isn’t the only president to pardon his friends and allies during his final days in office. Former President Bill Clinton was criticized for including wealthy fugitive Marc Rich in his final batch of reprieves, after Rich’s wife donated generously to Clinton’s presidential library. An investigation later concluded that the pardon was sketchy but not quite illegal.

Experts argue that the erratic clemency process should be fundamentally reimagined, either by taking it out of the president’s hands altogether or at least by moving it out of the Department of Justice. This could speed up the review process and remove review from the people whose careers were made by convicting those seeking clemency. Advocates argues that clemency should be molded into a tool for redressing the harsh sentencing practices of the early Sentencing Guidelines days since 1989. The sentences, especially for drug offense, disproportionately sent minorities to prison for long stretches.

The New York Times reported that “advocates said they were hopeful that the Biden administration would be able to revamp the clemency process, and that the pardons approved by Mr. Trump would give the next administration some cover with conservatives in the future.”

The Biden administration said it would not comment on the Trump pardons.

The Wall Street Journal, Trump Issues 73 Pardons, Including to Ex-Aide Steve Bannon (January 20, 2021)

The New York Times, Trump’s final wave of pardons includes names pushed by criminal justice reform advocates (January 21, 2021)

The Marshall Project, Trump’s Pardons Show The Process Has Always Been Broken (January 19, 2021)

– Thomas L. Root

We post news and comment on federal criminal justice issues, focused primarily on trial and post-conviction matters, legislative initiatives, and sentencing issues.

THINGS ARE GETTING WEIRD

Secret commutations. A phony White House pardon website. Capitol Hill rioters complaining on TV the president sent them to the insurrection, so he owes them a pardon. A promise of hundreds of clemencies. A president wonder-ing whether he can pardon himself.

For weeks, federal inmates have hoped President Trump would grant clemency to thousands of them on his way out the door. But if things looked like they were going sideways before Jan 6, they have gotten downright screwy since then.

As of this morning, the Washington Post reported “Trump is preparing to pardon or commute the sentences of more than 100 people in his final hours in office, decisions that are expected to be announced Monday or Tuesday, according to two people familiar with the discussions, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the plans.”

The Post said Trump “has been besieged by lobbyists and lawyers for well-heeled clients who are seeking to have their criminal convictions wiped from their records, as well as by advocates for criminal justice reform, who argue that their clients were wrongly convicted or were given unfair sentences and deserve to be freed from prison.” Trump’s clemency binge has been delayed by what the Post called increasing dysfunction stemming from the Capitol riot and impeachment, but he reportedly spent part of the weekend finalizing his list.

The President has always made a big deal of his clemencies, but last Tuesday, he quietly commuted the sentence of Fred Davis Clark, whose Ponzi theft of over $171 million got him a 480-month federal sentence two years ago. Fred’s docket said the 60-year old defendant had an out date beyond 2050, but the BOP released him last Tuesday. The White House has released no official statement on the clemency.

The White House did, however, release a statement declaring a pardon notice circulating on the right-wing website Parler to be fake. The phony post, which claimed to be from the Office of Pardon Attorney, said “POTUS is seriously considering PARDONING all of the patriots in the next week and a half. If you would like a pardon, please respond below.” It then asks for the rioter’s name, city and even “what crimes you think you need to be pardoned for,” asking for them by “Tuesday” so the President can get to work on them. (Some might suggest that the very notion of the President “working” should have been the tipoff that the post was a fraud).

Some of the people who thought that vandalizing the Capitol was great fun are apparently have second thoughts now that their selfies and tweets are leading to criminal charges. Jenna Ryan, a Texas real estate broker who was arrested for joining the attack on the Capitol, has pleaded with Trump to pardon her. After surrendering to the FBI on Friday, Ryan said: “We all deserve a pardon. I’m facing a prison sentence. I think I do not deserve that.” Ryan said she had been “displaying my patriotism,” adding, “I listen to my president who told me to go to the Capitol.”

The Dept of Justice issued a statement last weekend that “the information circulating on social media claiming to be from Acting Pardon Attorney Rosalind Sargent-Burns is inauthentic and should not be taken seriously.”

In private, the president has continued to pursue which pardons he can grant in his final days in office, calling advisers to ask for suggestions. The White House is expected to release dozens of pardons in the days before he leaves office, aides say. Aides say they don’t know if some of the most controversial pardons—including for Rudy Giuliani, for the president’s children, and for the president himself—will be among them.

The New York Times reported last night that “a lucrative market for pardons is coming to a head, with some of his allies collecting fees from wealthy felons or their associates to push the White House for clemency, according to documents and interviews with more than three dozen lobbyists and lawyers.” People reported to be selling services include former AUSA Brett Tolman, Trump’s personal lawyer John M. Dowd, and Guliani.

Politico reported last Friday that former White House advisor Steve Bannon – facing a federal fraud trial in May – is on the pardon list. Politico’s White House source said “two additional batches of pardons are expected — one on Friday night and one Wednesday morning before President-elect Joe Biden is sworn into office.” Of course, Friday has come and gone, and the first of the promised clemency lists did not happen. Last Monday, ABC reported that after some of Trump’s lawyers told him that if he pardons himself, he could be more vulnerable to civil lawsuits. “The president is angry,” ABC reporter Jonathan Karl said. “He has not taken that well, and I am told that he is now saying that he doesn’t want to see pardons for anybody. So the attitude seems to be: ‘If I can’t get a pardon, then nobody else should get one, either.'”

Washington Post, Trump prepares to offer clemency to more than 100 people in his final hours in office (January 18, 2021)

Law360.com, Trump Commutes Ex-Cay Clubs CEO’s Ponzi Sentence (January 14, 2021)

DOJ, Statement on Misinformation on Social Media Regarding the Office of the Pardon Attorney (January 9, 2021)

The Guardian, ‘I’m facing a prison sentence’: US Capitol rioters plead with Trump for pardons (January 16, 2021)

New York Times, Prospect of Pardons in Final Days Fuels Market to Buy Access to Trump (January 17, 2021)

Wall Street Journal, Trump Spends Final Days Focused on GOP Defectors, Senate Defense (January 16, 2021)

Politico, Trump weighing a pardon for Steve Bannon (January 15, 2021)

The Week, Trump is reportedly so angry aides are warning him against a self-pardon, he’s put all pardons ‘on hold’ (January 12, 2021)

– Thomas L. Root

We post news and comment on federal criminal justice issues, focused primarily on trial and post-conviction matters, legislative initiatives, and sentencing issues.

DID LAST WEEK’S TRUMP DEBACLE KILL HOPES OF CLEMENCY PUSH?

That the insurrection on Capitol Hill is leading to an unprecedented second impeachment for President Trump has dimmed some hopes for a lot of clemency activity before January 20. Others – including Ohio State University law professor Doug Berman (writing in his Sentencing Policy and Law blog) – believed as of late last week that Trump is still “planning to issue more clemency grants before he loses the power to do so.”

But things are changing quickly in D.C. Last night, ABC News reported that sources told it that

White House Counsel Pat Cipollone advised the president that he could face legal jeopardy for encouraging his supporters to storm the Capitol building, according to sources familiar with their discussions.

After these conversations, sources say the president grew angrier, and the entire pardon process has been described as “on hold” — meaning others who have been lobbying the president for pardons, including his personal attorney Rudy Giuliani, may not receive one.

ABC correspondent Jonathan Karl told ABC anchor David Muir that the president has been warned that self-pardon “would be seen as an admission that he did something wrong that he would need to be pardoned for. The president is angry, he has not taken that well, and I am told that he is now saying that he doesn’t want to see pardons for anybody. So the attitude seems to be: ‘If I can’t get a pardon, then nobody else should get one, either’.”

Bloomberg reported last week that Trump had prepared a sweeping list of people he’d hoped to pardon in the final days of his administration, including senior White House “people familiar with the matter,” Bloomberg said Trump intends to announce the pardons on Jan 19 – his final full day in office – and the list is currently being vetted by the White House counsel’s office. Besides Trump’s kids, in-laws and immediate staff, sources report, he is considering pardons for the husband of a Fox News personality, and rappers Lil Wayne and Kodak Black.

Trump’s most recent contretemps have not slowed down the lobbying for high-profile pardons. Former Baywatch star Pamela Anderson, a thoughtful and incisive commentator on world affairs, is pushing to have Wikileaks founder and accused rapist Julian Assange pardoned, and conservative Florida congressman Matt Gaetz (who most recently has alleged that Antifa members in MAGA hats, not Trump patriots, stormed the Capitol) has urged that Edward Snowden should be pardoned as well.

Berman wrote, “I am hopeful, but not really optimistic, that there will be some good number of final Trumpian clemency grants for persons who are not well-connected or famous.” But now it may develop that even the Kushners, Lil Waynes and Assanges of the world may still be waiting outside the White House, MAGA hats in hand, as Marine One carries President Trump away for the last time.

Even if a few of then favored get pardoned in the next 195 hours, the stats suggest there is little reason for the average prisoner to hold out optimism for Trump clemency. A recent study showed that only seven of the 94 Trump clemency grants over his term came on recommendation from the pardon attorney. Like it or not, the only way a clemency petition from someone who is not connected gets to the White House is through the Dept of Justice, not that a system leaving the prosecutor in charge of the clemency gateway is such a favored idea, either.

Berman wrote, “I hope Prez-elect Biden comes into office understanding that the best way to restore faith in the pardon power could be by using it right away to advance justice and mercy rather than parochial personal privilege.”

Lawfare, Trump’s Circumvention of the Justice Department Clemency Process (December 29, 2021)

Sentencing Law and Policy, Gearing up for Prez Trump’s coming final round of clemency grants (January 7, 2021)

ABC News, Trump warned about potential civil liability, as some aides clear out desks (January 11, 2021)

The Week, Trump is reportedly so angry aides are warning him against a self-pardon, he’s put all pardons ‘on hold’ (January 12, 2021)

Bloomberg, Trump Prepares Pardon List for Aides and Family, and Maybe Himself (January 7, 2021)

– Thomas L. Root

We post news and comment on federal criminal justice issues, focused primarily on trial and post-conviction matters, legislative initiatives, and sentencing issues.

IT’S WHO YOU KNOW…

A week ago today, President Donald J. Trump pardoned 15 people and commuted the sentences of five more. The next day, he pardoned 26 more people and commuted three additional sentences. And sources say there are more to come…

That’s the good news for federal inmates. The bad news is this: virtually everyone receiving clemency was supported by political figures or friends of the President. Perhaps the least celebrity of the lot was Alice Johnson, who was released from a drug conspiracy sentence in 2018 after Kim Kardashian lobbied Trump.

Alice has apparently become a Trump favorite after speaking at the Republican Convention last August (after which the President raised her commutation of sentence to a full pardon). Alice is using her access to successfully recommend a number of people for clemency (and who can blame her… she’s looking out for people she did time with, something anyone who’s ever been locked up understands).

But Alice’s support of average inmates she knew while doing 20 years aside, Politico said “the raft of pre-Christmas pardons and commutations… favored the well-connected and those with A-list advocates, while appearing to shunt aside — at least for now — more than 14,000 people who have applied for clemency through a small Justice Department office that handles such requests.

None of the clemency applications granted last week went through the Dept of Justice Office of Pardon Attorney. The New York Times reported that more than half of the cases granted did not meet the DOJ’s standards for consideration. “It looks as if the president is relying very heavily on recommendations from members of Congress and people he knows personally and not on the Justice Department pardon process that’s served presidents well for 150 years,” said Margaret Love, who served as pardon attorney under two presidents.

(Editor’s note: The DOJ pardon process has been a clattering disaster, despite what Ms. Love says, a classic illustration of the fox being placed in charge of deciding whether any chickens should be spared from being eaten. But replacing it with a process favoring only the friends [or friends of the friends] of the President is not an improvement.)

A tabulation by Harvard Law School professor Jack Goldsmith found that of Trump’s 45 pardons or commutations before last week, 88% went to people with personal ties to the president or to people who furthered his political aims. The pardons “continue Trump’s unprecedented pattern of issuing self-serving pardons and commutations that advance his personal interests, reward friends, seek retribution against enemies, or gratify political constituencies,” Goldsmith told The New York Times. “Like his past pardons, most if not all of them appear to be based on insider recommendations rather than normal Justice Department vetting process.”

The President “has largely overridden a highly bureaucratic process overseen by pardon lawyers for the Justice Department and handed considerable control to his closest White House aides, including Kushner,” Report Door said. “They, in turn, have outsourced much of the vetting process to political and personal allies, allowing private parties to play an outsize role in influencing the application of one of the most unchecked powers of the presidency.”

Trump’s son-in-law and top adviser, Jared Kushner, has played a key role in managing the avalanche of clemency requests that have come into the White House as the administration nears its end next month, according to multiple sources, Yahoo News reported. “Everyone’s sending emails to Jared,” a source familiar with the process reportedly said. “If you want to make something happen, go to Jared.”

The source, who requested anonymity due to the sensitivity of the ongoing process, spoke with Yahoo News before Trump issued the spate of pardons and commutations. “It’s going to be a free-for-all,” the source said.

Kevin Ring, president of criminal justice reform group FAMM, told The New York Times he was optimistic that Mr. Trump would still consider average and unconnected inmates, the kind of people his group backs. He predicted that the clemencies to come over the remaining three weeks of Trump’s presidency will include “head-scratchers mixed in with the ones that look good.”

Yet despite the likelihood of clemencies to come, criminal justice activists are not encouraged by Trump’s spotty and sparse record to date. Goldsmith said the president “is stingy” with his pardon power, “even as he abuses it.”

The White House, Statement from the Press Secretary Regarding Executive Grants of Clemency (December 22, 2020)

The White House, Statement from the Press Secretary Regarding Executive Grants of Clemency (December 23, 2020)

Politico, Trump’s latest batch of pardons favors the well-connected (December 22, 2020)

The New York Times, Trump Pardons Two Russia Inquiry Figures and Blackwater Guards (December 22, 2020)

Report Door, Behind Trump Clemency, a Case Study in Special Access (December 26, 2020)

Yahoo News, Jared Kushner played a key role in White House pardon ‘free-for-all’ (December 24, 2020)

The New York Times, Outside Trump’s Inner Circle, Odds Are Long for Getting Clemency (December 28, 2020)

– Thomas L. Root

We post news and comment on federal criminal justice issues, focused primarily on trial and post-conviction matters, legislative initiatives, and sentencing issues.

IT’S WHO YOU KNOW…

President Trump granted clemency to 11 people last week, including several big names such as Michael Milken and Bernard Kerik (pardons) and Rod Blagojevich (commutation), but also three current female Bureau of Prisons inmates. The media were obsessed with “political prisoner” Blago, but among BOP inmates, attention was focused on the three ordinary people were included on the list.

The women, two drug defendants and one serving a 35-year sentence for healthcare fraud, may have been ordinary inmates, but how they made Trump’s list proves once again that it’s who you know that counts.

(A pardon is complete exoneration from the conviction, while a commutation leaves the conviction in place but waives some or all of the remaining sentence.  “Clemency” is the overarching term for executive action to forgive by pardon or release through commutation).

Trump commuted Alice Marie Johnson’s life sentence in 2018 at the urging of reality TV star Kim Kardashian. Trump’s reelection campaign featured Johnson’s story in a recent Super Bowl ad. Johnson told the AP that when Trump had been looking specifically for female candidates, and asked her for a list of other women who deserved clemency, she gave him the names of her friends.

Amy Povah, founder of  clemency group Clemency for All Nonviolent Drug Offenders Foundation (CAN-DO Foundation), told The New York Times that she and other advocates submitted a list of about a dozen meritorious female offenders directly to the White House late last year. “When it boiled down to only three, it’s not surprising that the White House put value on the ones Alice served time with and knew their character,” Povah said. “You know who those diamonds are in there who are so deserving, and you know who the people are that are still engaging in shenanigans.”

While 14,000 clemency petitions sit unaddressed at the Justice Dept’s Office of Pardon Attorney, Trump continues to focus on clemency for people with connections. “There is now no longer any pretense of regularity,” Margaret Love, who served as pardon attorney under President Clinton, told The New York Times. “The president seems proud to declare that he makes his own decisions without relying on any official source of advice, but acts on the recommendation of friends, colleagues and political allies.”

Holly Harris, president of the criminal justice group Justice Action Network, applauded Trump “for taking these steps,” but told the Associated Press she hoped to see him use his power to help “any of the thousands of deserving individuals who are neither rich, nor famous, nor connected” and “every bit as deserving of a second chance.”

The Washington Post reported last week the White House is taking more control over clemency, with Trump aiming to limit DOJ’s role in the process as he weighs a flurry of additional clemency actions. The Post said that an informal task force of at least six people, has been meeting since late last year to discuss a revamped pardon system running through the White House. Senior Advisor Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, is taking a leading role in the new clemency initiative and has supported the idea of putting the White House more directly in control of the process, officials said.

Pam Bondi, a former Florida attorney general who served on Trump’s impeachment defense team, is also playing a significant role, vetting applications for clemency recipients. Kushner has personally reviewed applications with White House lawyers before presenting them to Trump for final approval, according to two senior administration officials.

Trump, who prefers granting clemency to people with compelling personal stories or lengthy sentences, is inclined to grant more clemency before facing voters in November. “He likes doing them,” the official said.

Washington Post, White House assembles team of advisers to guide clemency process as Trump considers more pardons (Feb. 19)

AP, President Trump goes on clemency spree, and the list is long (Feb. 8)

The New York Times, The 11 Criminals Granted Clemency by Trump Had One Thing in Common: Connections (Feb. 19)

The Norwalk Hour, Trump freed Alice Johnson in 2018. Tuesday, he freed three of her friends (Feb. 19)

– Thomas L. Root

We post news and comment on federal criminal justice issues, focused primarily on trial and post-conviction matters, legislative initiatives, and sentencing issues.

TRUMP GRANTS CLEMENCY TO A FEW MORE… TOO FEW MORE

President Trump last week commuted two sentences and granted pardons to five others who previously pleaded guilty to nonviolent crimes but have completed their sentences.

Trump commuted the sentence of Ronen Nahmani, who was serving a 20-year sentence for conspiracy to distribute the synthetic drug “spice.” The White House said Ronen had no prior criminal history and has five young children at home, the oldest is 13 years old, and a wife battling terminal cancer. Trump noted his case for an early release received bipartisan support from legislators.

Trump also commuted the sentence of Ted Suhl, an Arkansas man convicted in 2016 on four counts of bribery after prosecutors said he took part in a scheme to increase Medicaid payments to his faith-based behavioral health-care center for juveniles company. Suhl lost at the 8th Circuit, and was preparing to file in the Supreme Court. The White House noted his “spotless disciplinary record” over three years in prison and highlighted support for the commutation from former Gov. Mike Huckabee and former U.S. Attorney Bud Cummins.

Trump pardoned five other people who had already served their sentences, for offenses ranging from transferred government property illegally to transporting marijuana, to running an illegal gambling parlor in 1987 and stealing guns from luggage.

With Monday’s announcements, Trump has now pardoned or reduced the sentences of 19 individuals since taking office. Ohio State University law professor Douglas Berman noted in his Sentencing Law and Policy blog last Wednesday that with over 177,000 people in federal prison, “six commutations is, by all sensible measures, a very small number. The granting of only six commutations seems especially disappointing given that last year Prez Trump was talking about considering clemency requests that including “3,000 names, many of those names have been treated unfairly, … [and] in some cases, their sentences are far too long.”

Trump’s six clemency grants in his first term beats the first term records of every president since Reagan. The record is still held by Nixon, who granted 48 clemencies in his first term. Berman noted “that so very few federal prisoners have recently received clemency while the federal prison population has swelled makes these numbers even more depressing. The also look terrible if we look back further historically, as almost every other 20th Century US President (except for Dwight Eisenhower) granted a hundred or more commutations while in office (with Woodrow Wilson granting 341 in 1920 alone).”

The Hill, Trump announces seven pardons or commutations (July 29)

Wall Street Journal, Trump Commutes Prison Sentences in Medicaid Bribery, Drug Cases (July 29)

Sentencing Law and Policy, A (depressing) first-term scorecard for recent presidents (July 30)

– Thomas L. Root