Trump’s Pardon of Flynn Signals Prospect of a
Wave in His Final Weeks in Office
Political allies and associates are starting to press
for clemency as the president also considers extending his criminal justice
overhaul by commuting lengthy sentences for other offenders.
Kenneth P.
VogelEric Lipton
By Kenneth
P. Vogel and Eric Lipton
Nov. 25,
2020
WASHINGTON
— When President Trump pardoned Michael T. Flynn on Wednesday, he did more than
wipe clean the record of his first national security adviser, who had twice
pleaded guilty to lying to the F.B.I. He also bolstered the hopes of a wide
array of clemency seekers that he might deliver a wave of pardons and
commutations before leaving office.
Among the
others looking for pardons are two former Trump campaign advisers, Rick Gates
and George Papadopoulos, who like Mr. Flynn were convicted in cases stemming
from the special counsel’s Russia investigation.
But lawyers
and others who have been in touch with the White House say they anticipate that
Mr. Trump will use his authority in cases that extend beyond those involving
the special counsel’s inquiry and the lengthy cast of aides and associates who
have gotten in legal trouble since he first ran for the presidency.
Alan
Dershowitz, the law professor who represented Mr. Trump during his impeachment
trial, is advising two of his clients — a New Jersey man serving more than 20
years for defrauding investors, and a billionaire businessman convicted in
what’s been called “one of North Carolina’s worst government corruption
scandals” — on whether to seek clemency.
Mr.
Dershowitz said he recently discussed the pardon process with the White House.
He praised Mr. Trump’s pardon of Mr. Flynn, and said that “he should extend
that to others who are less well known.”
Several
groups that have pushed for a criminal justice overhaul are working with an ad
hoc White House team under the direction of Jared Kushner, Mr. Trump’s
son-in-law and adviser, with a goal of announcing as many as hundreds of
commutations for offenders now in jail for crimes ranging from nonviolent drug
convictions to mail fraud and money laundering.
“Lists of
people are being circulated,” said Brandon Sample, a Vermont lawyer who
specializes in presidential pardons and has submitted several names of people
to be considered. Among them is Russell Bradley Marks, 57, who has been
imprisoned after pleading guilty in 1992 on a cocaine-related conviction for
which he was given a mandatory life sentence.
The end of
any presidential administration is a time for intense lobbying related to
pardons.
But in Mr.
Trump’s case, it extends to his own personal and political considerations, his
lingering bitterness over the Russia inquiry and his transactional approach to
governing.
The sheer
number of people in the president’s circle to have gotten in trouble with the
law has also made the question of pardons especially fraught.
Mr. Flynn
has been enmeshed in a long battle to clear himself despite his admissions that
he had lied to investigators about his contacts with the Russian ambassador
during the presidential transition four years ago. The Justice Department had
moved in the spring to withdraw the charge against him, but his case remained
tied up in the courts.
In addition
to Mr. Flynn, Mr. Gates and Mr. Papadopoulos, Trump aides and associates who
have been convicted include Michael D. Cohen, Mr. Trump’s former lawyer; Roger
J. Stone Jr., his longtime friend and adviser; and Paul Manafort, his former
campaign chairman.
Others in
the president’s circle to face federal charges include Stephen K. Bannon, his former
strategist, who was indicted in August on charges of defrauding donors to a
campaign to support Mr. Trump’s plans to build a wall along the border with
Mexico, and Elliott Broidy, a top fund-raiser, who pleaded guilty last month in
a foreign lobbying case.
Activists
see a blitz of late pardons for people without political connections as a way
for Mr. Trump to build on his efforts to reform the criminal justice system,
including what is considered the most consequential legislation in a
generation, which reduced sentences for nonviolent offenders.
Far more
explosive in political terms is the possibility of pardons or commutations for
allies, associates or even himself, reflecting Mr. Trump’s oft-stated belief
that his presidency was undermined by law enforcement investigations, including
the special counsel’s inquiry.
“The
president knows how much those of us who worked for him have suffered, and I
hope he takes that into consideration if and when he grants any pardons,” said
Mr. Gates, who served as Mr. Trump’s deputy campaign chairman in 2016 before
pleading guilty to financial fraud and lying to investigators.
Before
Wednesday, Mr. Trump had granted 28 pardons, which wipe out convictions, and 16
commutations, which reduce prison sentences.
Of the
actions Mr. Trump has taken, many have benefited individuals with a personal or
political connection to him.
They
include Mr. Stone, who had been convicted of charges brought by the special
counsel, the conservative commentator Dinesh D’Souza and the former Wall Street
executive Michael Milken, whose bid for a pardon drew support from Treasury
Secretary Steven Mnuchin.
Mr. Trump
also has mused about pardoning Mr. Manafort, who was sentenced to seven and a
half years in prison for obstructing justice and violating financial and
lobbying laws, in the highest-profile of the cases brought by the special
counsel.
There is
open speculation about whether he might go even further in using his clemency
power in his self-interest, possibly issuing pre-emptive pardons to members of
his family and even himself for federal crimes.
Even if
such a self-pardon were possible — scholars differ on the legality — it would
not inoculate Mr. Trump against possible charges stemming from ongoing
investigations into his business and finances by city and state prosecutors in
New York.
The planned
clemency initiative, and the lobbying that has unfolded around it, has been
hindered in some ways in recent weeks by Mr. Trump’s refusal to formally
concede his loss to President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.
Potential
pardon seekers and their representatives said in interviews that they were
waiting to escalate their appeals until Mr. Trump conceded, or at least
signaled that he had started to come to grips with the looming end of his
presidency.
“As long as
they’re fighting this and there are court cases and the Electoral College
hasn’t voted, it seems premature,” said Bud Cummins, a former U.S. attorney who
was credited by the White House for helping persuade Mr. Trump to commute the
sentence last year of one of his clients, a politically connected Arkansas
businessman convicted of bribery related to Medicaid fraud.
Mr.
Cummins, who was registered to lobby this year for a firm co-founded by two
Trump campaign aides, said “lots of people” had approached him asking for help
winning pardons from Mr. Trump. He declined to identify them.
Other
potential pardon seekers and their allies are discussing a range of strategies
to win over the president. They include highlighting donations to Mr. Trump,
spending money at his properties, trying to hire lawyers or lobbyists seen as
close to him and emphasizing business connections that could help Mr. Trump
after he leaves office.
Mr. Gates,
who received a 45-day jail sentence after cooperating with investigators,
published a book last month accusing the special counsel’s team of using
devious strong-arm tactics to pursue Mr. Trump and his allies. Mr. Gates
conceded that his criticism of the investigation could potentially help with a
pardon, but he added that “my motivation in writing the book was not to seek a
pardon; it was to expose the truth about the Russia investigation.”
Mr.
Papadopoulos, who pleaded guilty to lying to the F.B.I. and served 12 days in
jail, has also been very public in his embrace of Mr. Trump. He appeared at the
Trump National Doral resort in Florida last month for a conference of
conservative activists, where he promoted his book, “Deep State Target: How I
Got Caught in the Cross Hairs of the Plot to Bring Down President Trump.”
In an
interview, he said his support for Mr. Trump was not inspired by his pursuit of
a pardon, adding that he did not expect he would get one but still hoped it
would happen.
“Of course
I would be honored to be pardoned,” Mr. Papadopoulos said.
Others
seeking creative ways to forge ties to the president include Joseph
Maldonado-Passage, the former Oklahoma zoo owner who is better known as Joe
Exotic. His representatives have been running a carefully orchestrated campaign
to try to persuade Mr. Trump to pardon Mr. Maldonado-Passage, who is one year
into a 22-year sentence for trying to hire a hit man to kill an animal-rights
activist.
They have
focused on getting Mr. Trump’s attention through appeals to Donald Trump Jr.
and Mr. Kushner, appearances on Fox News and a visit to the Trump International
Hotel in Washington where, one organizer said, they ran up a tab of about
$10,000 to try to get Mr. Trump’s attention.
Mr.
Dershowitz is exploring applying for pardons on behalf of Greg E. Lindberg, a
North Carolina businessman who was sentenced in August to more than seven years
in prison for his role in a bribery scheme that shook the state’s Republican
Party, and Eliyahu Weinstein, a New Jersey man sentenced to more than 20 years
in prison for a real estate Ponzi scheme.
Mr.
Dershowitz said he had not approached Mr. Trump about either case, though he
recalled an earlier conversation in which he explained his general philosophy
on the importance of pardons to Mr. Trump.
The
president, Mr. Dershowitz said, “was very interested in the concept of the
pardon power being more than just clemency, but being part of the system of
checks and balances for excessive legislative or judicial actions.”
Ken Vogel
covers the confluence of money, politics and influence from Washington. He is
also the author of “Big Money: 2.5 Billion Dollars, One Suspicious Vehicle, and
a Pimp — on the Trail of the Ultra-Rich Hijacking American Politics.” @kenvogel
• Facebook
Eric Lipton
is a Washington-based investigative reporter. A three-time winner of the
Pulitzer Prize, he previously worked at The Washington Post and The Hartford
Courant. @EricLiptonNYT
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