Latest news with #ScottJenkins
Washington Post
8 hours ago
- General
- Washington Post
‘No MAGA left behind': The trouble with Trump's pardons
A jury convicted Scott Jenkins, the disgraced ex-sheriff of Culpeper County in Virginia, of taking more than $75,000 in bribes in exchange for deputizing rich businessmen so they could get out of speeding tickets and carry guns without permits. Two undercover FBI agents who gave him envelopes of cash after he gave them badges testified at his trial. Luckily for Jenkins, he has long been an outspoken supporter of President Donald Trump. On Monday, the day before he was due to report for his 10-year prison sentence, Trump pardoned him.
CNN
3 days ago
- Business
- CNN
‘No MAGA left behind': Trump's pardons get even more political
As President Donald Trump's interim US attorney for the District of Columbia, Ed Martin was remarkably blunt about intermingling Trump's political goals with the ostensibly independent actions of the Justice Department. That might have cost him the permanent gig. So leave it to Martin, now Trump's pardon attorney, to say the quiet part out loud about Trump's pardons. 'No MAGA left behind,' Martin posted Monday on X. Martin's missive came after Trump pardoned a MAGA-supporting former Virginia sheriff, Scott Jenkins, who had been convicted of bribery. Martin's further posts suggested this pardon wasn't about rewarding a Trump ally, per se – a more problematic proposition – but rather about correcting what Trump allies argue was a weaponized Biden administration prosecution. However, if you look closely at how Trump's used his pardon power – which he has exercised dramatically this week, with a slew of new pardons and commutations on Wednesday alone – it's virtually impossible to miss the political overtones. Many of Trump's acts of clemency have rewarded an ally or someone tied to an ally, or they have served a clear and not terribly subtle political purpose. Politics have loomed over other controversial and high-profile pardons – from Andrew Jackson's, to Gerald Ford pardoning Richard Nixon, to Bill Clinton pardoning Marc Rich, to Joe Biden pardoning his own son. (Biden in his closing days also preemptively pardoned other family members and Trump critics who hadn't been accused or convicted of crimes, because Trump and his allies had suggested they could be targeted.) But Trump took things up a level by pardoning a spate of key convicted allies in his first term, often without the kind of extensive process usually used in pardons. And his second term continues to push the envelope. The big one, of course, was the blanket pardoning of virtually all January 6, 2021, defendants – about 1,500 people in total. These were people who quite literally rose up on Trump's behalf and in some cases assaulted police. Trump pardoned nearly all of them even as polling later showed 83% of Americans opposed his pardons for those convicted of violent crimes. There has been more where that came from this week. On Monday, Trump pardoned the MAGA-supporting former sheriff. Jenkins was sentenced to 10 years in prison (during the Trump administration) for offering local businessmen positions as auxiliary deputy sheriffs in return for campaign contributions. On Tuesday, Trump made a splash when he spared reality TV stars Todd and Julie Chrisley lengthy prison sentences for bank fraud after their daughter campaigned extensively for Trump in 2024. Campaign assistance appears to be a common denominator for some Trump pardons. The New York Times reported on Tuesday, for example, that Trump's April pardon of convicted nursing home executive Paul Walczak came after Walczak's mother raised millions for Trump and other Republicans, sought to publicize the diary of Biden's daughter, and attended a $1-million-per-person fundraising dinner last month. Walczak even cited his mother's pro-Trump political activity in his pardon application. And on Wednesday, as Martin took to social media again to proclaim it 'pardon day,' Trump granted clemency to even more individuals, including pardoning former GOP Rep. Michael Grimm of New York. That means Trump has now pardoned no fewer than eight convicted former GOP members of Congress, between his first and second terms. Earlier in the day, Trump suggested that next in line for pardons could be two men convicted of conspiring to kidnap Democratic Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. ('It looked to me like somewhat of a railroad job,' Trump said.) Beyond the pardons mentioned above, Trump has also pardoned or granted clemency to: Former Republican Connecticut Gov. John Rowland, who was convicted on two separate occasions in recent decades Mark Bashaw, an officer who formerly served at the Army Public Health Center and was found guilty of violating the Biden administration's military Covid safety rules by a court martial Trevor Milton, who with his wife gave Trump's reelection effort $1.8 million just a month before the 2024 election and had been represented by lawyers with ties to Trump Ross Ulbricht, whom Trump had pledged to pardon during the 2024 campaign as an appeal to potential libertarian supporters Two key witnesses in the Biden impeachment inquiry (Devon Archer and Jason Galanis) Brian Kelsey, a Republican former state senator from Tennessee Ex-Illinois Democratic Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who has supported Trump and called himself a 'Trumpocrat' Former Las Vegas City Councilwoman Michele Fiore, a Republican who some have labeled 'Lady Trump' About two dozen people convicted of blocking access to abortion clinics In case the politics of that last one weren't clear enough, Trump announced the pardons just a day before he addressed the anti-abortion-rights 'March for Life' in January. Indeed, you have to strain pretty hard to find Trump pardons or grants of clemency that don't have some kind of political element. Trump in March pardoned three cryptocurrency figures who don't have an obvious political connection to him. But he's also made inroads – both political and personal – into the crypto world, and has pushed for deregulation. He pardoned two DC police officers convicted in a deadly pursuit, and he did so with at least some support from D.C.'s police chief and Democratic mayor. But he also suggested the police had been targeted 'because they went after an illegal' – suggesting the decision was linked to his harsh anti-illegal immigration efforts. Jean Pinkard might be Trump's most normal-sounding act of clemency, given she was sentenced to just one year in prison and has battled cancer. But even there, she was represented by a lawyer who prominently pushed Trump's baseless claims of a stolen 2020 election. Trump on Wednesday also made several pardons and commutations with no immediately apparent political nexus. For instance, he commuted the sentence of former Gangster Disciples co-founder Larry Hoover, just months after Biden pardoned Hoover's second-in-command. Regardless of intent, the pattern of Trump's pardons is pretty clear. They're heavily focused on people who support Trump or have ties to him, those who targeted people Trump also doesn't like, and instances where the pardons could send messages to key constituencies. And there's no sign it's going to slow down any time soon – especially where Martin is involved.
CBC
3 days ago
- Business
- CBC
'No MAGA left behind': Trump turning pardons into partisan exercise, critics say
As U.S. President Donald Trump makes a dizzying series of tariff proclamations, puts Ivy League schools in his sights over their policies, and tries to broker ceasefire agreements in global conflicts, his administration is periodically issuing pardons and commutations that attract less media attention. These recent decisions — which included a pardon Tuesday for a reality-show couple convicting of defrauding banks out of more than $30 million US — haven't led the widespread condemnation that met Trump's sweeping pardon of some 1,500 people, many convicted of violent assault, in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot. Based on the evidence so far, many of the subsequent pardons seem to be less about the legal nuances of specific cases than affiliation and partisanship. Trump on Monday said he would pardon Scott Jenkins, alleging in a social media post that the Virginia sheriff was the victim of an "overzealous" Justice Department in president Joe Biden's term and by a judge appointed by Biden. In fact, the Culpeper County sheriff was seen on video during his 2024 trial accepting cash, part of what prosecutors said was a pattern of taking money in exchange for auxiliary sheriff badges, as well as for personal gain. Jenkins, who's run as both a Republican and an independent, said last month he had hoped to plead for clemency directly with the Trump administration. Democrat Abigail Spanberger, running for governor in Virginia, panned the pardon in a social media post that pointed out that a jury of U.S. citizens, not a politicized individual or body, voted to convict Jenkins on 12 separate counts. Spanberger said the pardon was an "affront" to many officials, including "the law enforcement officers who investigated this case and hold themselves to the highest ethical standard every day." Former Ronald Reagan administration official and longtime conservative commentator William Kristol excoriated the pardon of Jenkins, arguing it sends a signal to Trump-supporting sheriffs "that they can act with immunity." "MAGA vigilantism over the next four years will be supercharged," Kristol wrote for the Bulwark. MAGA loyalists, Biden antagonists Nevada politician Michele Fiore, a staunch MAGA loyalist for a decade, was pardoned in April. Fiore was convicted after raising more than $70,000 for a statue for a slain Las Vegas police officer but instead spent some of the donations on cosmetic surgery, rent and her daughter's wedding. Brian Kalt, a Michigan State University constitutional law expert who's written about presidential pardons, told the Las Vegas Review-Journal after the Fiore pardon that "the main criterion seems to be someone is a supporter and if [Trump] can sort of identify with them as the victim of a politically motivated prosecution." In the case of Nikola electric vehicle founder Trevor Milton's pardon, issued in March, Trump said, "They say the thing that he did wrong was he was one of the first people that supported a gentleman named Donald Trump for president." In response to the president's comments, the nonprofit watchdog organization Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington Inc. (CREW) posted: "Well, one thing's for sure: Trevor Milton and his wife donated more than $1.8 million to the Trump 47 Committee in the weeks before the election." It also didn't escape notice from Democrats that Milton, convicted of wire and securities fraud, was represented during his legal travails by lawyers including Brad Bondi — brother of current Republican attorney general Pam Bondi — and Marc Mukasey, who has represented the Trump Organization. There have also been pardons and sentence commutations for individuals who have, coincidentally or not, painted Biden's children in an unfavourable light. Jason Galanis and Devon Archer, who gave critical testimony about one-time business associate Hunter Biden, the president's son, on Capitol Hill, had their sentences for defrauding an Indigenous tribe in a separate transaction commuted by Trump. Paul Walczak, the son of a major Trump donor who was convicted of income tax fraud and ordered to pay over $4 million in restitution, received another pardon slammed by CREW and Democrats. In describing the presidential action, the New York Times headline read: Trump Pardons Executive Whose Family Sought to Publicize Ashley Biden's Diary. Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy on the Walczak pardon: Trump's Justice Department weaponized: legal analyst Presidents have broad power to pardon federal crimes or commute sentences, as an act of mercy or justice, and Democratic presidents have faced criticism in certain cases: Jimmy Carter for executive actions involving folk singer Peter Yarrow and kidnapped heiress Patricia Hearst, and Bill Clinton for pardoning Marc Rich, an international fugitive whose former spouse was a Democratic donor. But according to Liz Oyer, the cost of these 2025 pardons is significant. Oyer, the former chief pardon attorney who is suing the government after being fired in March, has argued in a series of TikTok videos that it's not just the optics that are suboptimal. It costs taxpayers, Oyer says, as those pardoned no longer are mandated by the courts to pay back ill-gotten proceeds. She estimates that the total of debts wiped off the books is over $1.2 billion so far. Biden was only the second president in over a century whose pardons overall did not number in the hundreds or even the thousands, according to Pew Research. But among the 80 he granted, he received considerable criticism for pre-emptive pardons for figures who are hated by many of Trump's MAGA supporters, including Dr. Anthony Fauci and military leader Gen. Mark Milley. Legal analyst Dan Abrams, founder of Mediaite and host of a Sirius radio program, was in that camp, but said last week he'd changed his mind. "President Biden was right to preemptively pardon these folks even though it sets a terrible precedent; what we have seen [so far] is much worse," he said. Abrams said he changed his mind because "it is clear now that this administration is going to use the [Department of Justice] as a weapon," pointing to a series of threats from the White House and its cabinet members to investigate former or current Trump critics, from former FBI director James Comey for a seashell display on the beach, to former Trump administration cybersecurity expert Chris Krebs. In addition, Democratic Congress member LaMonica McIver has been charged over a fracas at an immigrant detention centre. Can Trump really revoke Biden's pardons? | About That 2 months ago Duration 11:10 'We can't leave those guys behind' Trump, indicted in four separate criminal matters until three of those cases fell away in the wake of his November election win, spent considerable time railing on the campaign trail about a justice system he said was weaponized against Republicans. Democrats have pointed out that despite those claims, mimicked by some Republican Congress members, the Justice Department in Biden's term appeared to pursue cases without favour. Prosecutions were pursued against Hunter Biden, Democratic legislators Bob Menendez and Henry Cuellar, and Democratic Mayor Eric Adams in New York City. It's not clear if federal prosecutors in this administration will aggressively probe suspected criminal activity by Republicans. But in Trump's first term, Justice Department officials under the auspices of then-attorney general William Barr sought to intervene in sentencing on behalf of Roger Stone and Michael Flynn, Trump loyalists charged with federal crimes. Both Stone and Flynn were subsequently pardoned. Trump has tapped loyalist Ed Martin to replace Oyer as chief pardon attorney. Martin was originally chosen to be lead attorney in D.C., but the required Senate confirmation appeared doomed given his staunch support of 2021 Capitol rioters, including of an avowed white supremacist Martin referred to as a friend. Martin, not needing Senate confirmation in his new role, recently told a radio host he's taking a "hard look" at the convictions of two men convicted in federal court over a plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, adding, "We can't leave those guys behind."
Wall Street Journal
4 days ago
- General
- Wall Street Journal
Trump's New Pardon Attorney Is Eager to Target Biden-Era Cases
WASHINGTON—After a star-crossed stint as the District of Columbia's top prosecutor, Ed Martin, a Trump loyalist, has a new role as the Justice Department's pardon attorney—and he is quickly using it to target Biden-era prosecutions that rankled conservatives. Martin's first clemency recommendation was successful Monday, when President Trump said he would pardon Scott Jenkins, a former Virginia sheriff who was convicted of corruption-related charges and was set to begin serving a 10-year-sentence this week.
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Climate
- Yahoo
Officials: Two school buses sustain minor damage after crash in Montgomery County
MONTGOMERY COUNTY, Md. (DC News Now) — Montgomery County Fire & Rescue Service responded to the report of two school buses crashing in Rockville on Tuesday morning. Who is Scott Jenkins? What to know about the ex-sheriff Trump pardoned The incident occurred at the intersection of Rockville Pike and Nicholson Lane. The fire department said the buses had minor damage and no one was hurt. DC News Now has reached out to the school district for a statement. Check for updates. To keep up with the latest news and weather updates, download our Mobile App on iPhone or Android. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
