On the first day of his second term as president, Donald Trump acted on one of his top priorities: The Republican issued roughly 1,500 pardons and commuted the sentences of 14 Jan. 6 criminals, including violent felons who were in prison for assaulting police officers. A few days later, he kept going, pardoning 23 anti-abortion-rights activists, seemingly indifferent to their guilt.
And despite all of the chest-thumping rhetoric about “law and order” and being “tough on crime,” the president continues to find convicted felons he’s eager to help. NBC News reported:
President Donald Trump on Monday issued a full pardon to former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich. Blagojevich, 68, who was a Democrat while in office had served eight years in prison on charges stemming from his effort to sell Barack Obama’s Senate seat after Obama won the 2008 presidential election.
“It’s my pleasure,” Trump said during remarks in the Oval Office. He added, in reference to Blagojevich, “I think he’s a very fine person. This shouldn’t have happened to him.”
In context, “this” referred to the prosecution of the former governor, who was caught on tape effectively trying to sell a U.S. Senate seat. As NBC News’ report added, Blagojevich “was also convicted of shaking down a children’s hospital executive for campaign contributions and holding up a bill involving the horse-racing industry in exchange for campaign contributions.”
What’s more, let’s not forget that this wasn’t the first presidential favor Trump did for the former governor. During Trump’s first term, every Republican member of Congress from Illinois asked the president not to commute Blagojevich’s sentence. Trump ignored them and did it anyway, helping the Illinois Democrat who appeared as a contestant on Trump’s reality TV game show in 2010.
Traditionally, presidents have issued pardons in order to right a wrong or protect those who have been falsely accused of wrongdoing. Trump, however, didn’t bother finding flaws in the criminal case against Blagojevich. He simply pardoned the former inmate because he sees the felon as an ally.
What’s more, let’s not overlook the fact that in 2019, Blagojevich’s wife repeatedly went on Fox News to make appeals to Trump on her husband’s behalf, while slamming people like former FBI Director James Comey and former special counsel Robert Mueller, no doubt aware of Trump’s contempt for them. The president took notice, and specifically said, while commuting Blagojevich’s prison sentence, “I watched his wife on television.”
The lesson for the broader public was ridiculous but unmistakable: If you want to curry favor with the White House, go on Fox News and say the words the president wants to hear.
But let’s also not overlook what is arguably the most important lesson of them all: Trump appears to have a soft spot for politicians convicted of corruption. Indeed, the pattern is unmistakable. The Washington Post published this memorable round-up on the last day of Trump’s first term: Since Trump took office, two incumbent Republican congressmen have been convicted of crimes, Chris Collins (R-N.Y.) and Duncan D. Hunter (R-Calif.), as has a former congressman, Steve Stockman (R-Tex.). Trump pardoned all three of them. Trump also pardoned four former Republican congressmen convicted before his presidency: Rick Renzi (R-Ariz.), Robin Hayes (R-N.C.), Mark Siljander (R-Mich.) and Randall “Duke” Cunningham (R-Calif.). … [A]ccording to GovTrack’s Legislator Misconduct Database, Trump has now pardoned a majority of Republican congressmen convicted of felonies in the 21st century.
As the president’s second term gets underway, he hasn’t just pardoned a man synonymous with corruption in Illinois politics, his administration has also abandoned the criminal case against a former Republican congressman who’d already been found guilty of corruption by a jury, while simultaneously taking steps to abandon a corruption investigation targeting an incumbent Republican congressman. It’s against this backdrop that the Trump administration is also taking steps to drop corruption charges against New York City Mayor Eric Adams, a Democrat who has spent an unfortunate amount of time sucking up to Republicans lately. The message to politicians convicted or accused of corruption couldn’t be clearer: You have a friend in the Oval Office.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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