President Donald Trump will pardon former Puerto Rico Gov. Wanda Vázquez Garced, who pleaded guilty to a corruption charge related to her 2020 campaign, a White House official confirmed to MS NOW on Friday.
Vázquez was arrested in August 2022 on charges of conspiracy, bribery and wire fraud. Federal officials alleged that she accepted more than $300,000 in campaign contributions from an FBI agent turned consultant, Mark Rossini, and from Julio Martin Herrera-Velutini, an international bank owner whose bank was under investigation by Puerto Rican authorities.
In return, prosecutors contended, Vázquez appointed a new commissioner of the office overseeing the bank probe, selected by Herrera.
Trump is also pardoning Rossini and Herrera, according to the White House official, who spoke on condition of anonymity ahead of the pardons being publicly announced.
Vázquez initially pleaded not guilty, then changed her plea to guilty on a lesser charge last August.
The pardon was first reported by CBS News.
Vázquez assumed office in August 2019, after her predecessor resigned, and lost a primary for the center-right New Progressive Party the following year.
Soon after, she endorsed Trump’s unsuccessful reelection bid.
The pardons are the latest in a host of them issued by Trump in his second term. On his first day back in office, he pardoned nearly 1,600 people who were charged or convicted in the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol.
Trump has since pardoned, among many others, ex-Rep. George Santos, reality TV stars Todd and Julie Chrisley and former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández, who was convicted in one of the largest drug trafficking cases in U.S. history. Among other notable pardons this week, Trump freed fraudster Adriana Camberos for the second time. The move marks a rare occasion that a person benefits from presidential intervention more than once. Trump previously granted Camberos, a San Diego businesswoman, clemency in January 2021. Trump commuted her 26-month prison sentence for a 2017 conviction related to a counterfeit 5-Hour Energy scheme that involved millions of dollars in fake products. The commutation shortened her sentence but did not erase the conviction. Following her release, Camberos and her brother, Andres Camberos, were convicted on fraud charges in 2024 for a scheme that involved lying to manufacturers to buy wholesale groceries and other goods at steep discounts, saying they would be sold in Mexico or to prisons, and instead selling them to U.S. distributors. According to The New York Times and Bloomberg, both siblings received pardons from Trump this week. Ebony Davis contributed to this report.
Jake Traylor
Jake Traylor is a White House correspondent for MS NOW.
Julianne McShane is a breaking news reporter for MS NOW. Recommended
