{"id":12133,"date":"2025-06-27T11:43:47","date_gmt":"2025-06-27T11:43:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/firearmman.com\/?p=12133"},"modified":"2025-06-27T11:43:49","modified_gmt":"2025-06-27T11:43:49","slug":"pardon-applications-are-being-carefully-crafted-with-one-man-in-mind-donald-trump","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/firearmman.com\/?p=12133","title":{"rendered":"Pardon applications are being carefully crafted with one man in mind: Donald Trump"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

ASHLAND, Ky. — <\/span>Pounding away on a prison typewriter, Chad Scott seemed worlds apart from President Donald Trump<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But when the disgraced narcotics agent wrote the White House seeking clemency for his corruption conviction, Scott sought to draw Trump\u2019s attention to what they have in common.<\/p>\n

Both men had survived a bullet wound to the ear, Scott wrote, and had been convicted of falsifying records. They were also each a victim of \u201cpolitical persecution,\u201d the type of catchphrase the former agent hoped would resonate with a man who has long complained of witch hunts.<\/p>\n

By helping him, Scott argued, Trump would be showing he had \u201cthe back of law enforcement.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cChad Scott is a hero in this country\u2019s war on drugs,\u201d his attorney wrote in a clemency petition reviewed by The Associated Press, adding it would be a \u201cgross waste of taxpayer money\u201d to house and feed the former U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agent for six more years.<\/p>\n

Scott\u2019s application is hardly unique, according to prisoners, defense attorneys and officials. The White House and the Justice Department have received a wave of such requests \u2014 all carefully crafted to capture the attention and fancy of Trump or those who know his inclinations.<\/p>\n

The flurry, legal experts said, has been sparked by Trump\u2019s frequent and eyebrow-raising grants of clemency since retaking office in January. The Republican president has pardoned and commuted the sentences of more than 1,600 people, including many political allies, former GOP officeholders and hundreds charged or convicted in the 2021 Capitol riot<\/a>. He even pardoned a pair of reality TV stars<\/a> who were serving time for bank fraud and tax evasion.<\/p>\n

In doing so, Trump has largely cast aside a process that historically has been overseen by nonpolitical personnel at the Justice Department who spent their days poring over clemency applications \u2014 thick packets filled with character references attesting to applicants’ atonement and good deeds. Only those meeting strict criteria were then passed along to the White House.<\/p>\n

Those procedures appear to have been replaced by the caprice of a president known for his transactional approach to governance, his loyalty to supporters and his disdain for perceived enemies.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s created \u201ca free-for-all\u201d for those seeking clemency, said Liz Oyer, the Justice Department\u2019s former pardon attorney, who was fired in March. \u201cThe traditional process and practices,\u201d she told the AP, \u201call seem to have fallen by the wayside.\u201d<\/p>\n

That has left an opening for prisoners like Eric Sanchez Chaparro, who is seeking a commutation for a drug and weapons conviction that carries a 19-year prison sentence. The optimism, he said, has never been higher for those behind bars.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn many ways I feel like he has the same point of view that we\u2019ve got,\u201d Chaparro said in a telephone interview, noting that both he and the president were convicted of felonies. Trump was convicted last year on New York state charges of falsifying business records related to hush money payments to a porn star<\/a> but was sentenced to no punishment.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven though people try to put him down,\u201d Chaparro added, \u201che kept on pushing for his goal.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Trump administration did not disclose how many people have reached out to Trump or White House officials to seek clemency, though some have boasted of doing so in colorful ways. Last week, Joe Exotic, the former zookeeper known as the \u201cTiger King,\u201d posted a song<\/a> he said he wrote for Trump on social media, claiming he was \u201cpaying the time for a crime I didn\u2019t do.\u201d He\u2019s serving a 21-year sentence<\/a> for the failed murder-for-hire of an animal-welfare activist.<\/p>\n

Since Trump retook office five months ago, his Justice Department has received more than 9,300 petitions seeking commutations of sentences or pardons. At that pace, the tally would blow past the approximately 15,000 petitions filed during the four years of President Joe Biden’s Democratic administration. The Justice Department received about 12,000 petitions in Trump\u2019s first term.<\/p>\n

Clemency is perhaps the most unchecked power enjoyed by a president, as actions cannot be undone by courts or other officials. Presidents can commute sentences \u2014 reducing or eliminating them \u2014 or bestow a pardon that wipes away convictions or criminal charges.<\/p>\n

Trump is hardly the first president to generate controversy over how he has handled such powers. Biden prompted bipartisan outrage in December when he pardoned his son Hunter, sparing him a possible prison sentence<\/a> for felony gun and tax convictions. And Biden was sharply criticized \u2014 mainly by Republicans \u2014 for issuing preemptive pardons to protect lawmakers, former officials and his family members from what he described as a potentially vindictive Trump administration.<\/p>\n

Even so, legal scholars say, Trump\u2019s approach to clemency has veered into unprecedented territory.<\/p>\n

The president, for example, tapped a vociferous political supporter, Ed Martin Jr.<\/a>, to be the Justice Department’s pardon attorney. Martin is a former defense lawyer who represented Jan. 6 rioters and promoted false claims that the 2020 election had been stolen by Democrats. Trump gave Martin the post after pulling his nomination to be the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia in the face of bipartisan concerns over his divisive politics. Martin did not respond to requests for comment. <\/p>\n

Much of Trump\u2019s mercy has gone to political allies<\/a>, campaign donors and fraudsters who claimed they were victims of a \u201cweaponized\u201d Justice Department. The pardons that have drawn the most attention include one issued to a tax cheat whose mother raised millions of dollars for Republican causes.<\/p>\n

There was the pardon of a prolific straw donor<\/a> for foreign contributions who gave $900,000 to Trump\u2019s first inaugural committee. Trump voided the conviction of Scott Jenkins, a Virginia sheriff and vocal Trump supporter, sentenced to 10 years for deputizing several businessmen in exchange for cash payments.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat these pardons signal \u2014 together with everything else \u2014 is that all bets are now off,\u201d said Frank Bowman, a legal historian and professor emeritus at the University of Missouri School of Law who is writing a book on pardons. \u201cIt\u2019s a grotesque misuse of constitutional authority of a kind that has never been seen in American history.\u201d<\/p>\n

Administration officials say Trump decides on clemency requests after they\u2019re vetted by the White House Counsel\u2019s Office, the White House pardon czar and the Justice Department. Reviewers have been focusing on nonviolent, rehabilitated criminals with compelling references, the officials said. The White House is also considering petitions from those serving unjustified sentences and what the administration deems \u201cover-prosecution.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cPresident Trump doesn\u2019t need lectures from Democrats about his use of pardons, especially from those who supported a president who pardoned his corrupt son, shielded Dr. Fauci<\/a> from accountability for the millions who suffered under his failed COVID leadership and backed the infamous \u2018kids-for-cash\u2019 judge<\/a> who profited from incarcerating children,\u201d White House spokesperson Harrison Fields said in an email. \u201cPresident Trump is using his pardon and commutation powers to right many wrongs, acting reasonably and responsibly within his constitutional authority.\u201d <\/p>\n

All the while, Trump\u2019s approach has spread hope among lesser-connected prisoners who long ago exhausted their appeals, a half dozen federal prisoners told the AP in interviews.<\/p>\n

A remedy long likened to winning the lottery seems more attainable in an administration that has dispensed with many of the traditional criteria considered in clemency, including remorse, the severity of the crime and the amount of time a prisoner has already served.<\/p>\n

Jonathan E. Woods, an early Trump supporter and former Arkansas state senator, is serving an 18-year sentence for a bribery conviction.<\/p>\n

The former legislator believes he has a legitimate shot at winning a commutation because, he wrote to the AP, \u201cPresident Trump is viewed as someone as having a big heart, nonjudgmental and someone who has been put through hell by a very imperfect legal system.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cInmates view him as someone who will listen to them in hopes of going home early to their loved ones,\u201d Woods added. <\/p>\n

Woods, who is serving time in a prison in Texas, has also raised allegations he hopes will resonate with the president: evidence of misconduct by an FBI agent who investigated the former state senator. That agent pleaded guilty<\/a> to \u201ccorruptly destroying\u201d his government hard drive in Woods\u2019 case. <\/p>\n

Trump spent years blasting the FBI, particularly for how it investigated him over allegations of Russian interference<\/a> in the 2016 campaign and its role in the Justice Department’s ill-fated prosecutions of Trump<\/a> in the Capitol riot and his retention of classified documents at his Florida resort.<\/p>\n

Less political appeals have also been fruitful \u2014 thanks to the president\u2019s advisers.<\/p>\n

Those working to land pardons for Eddie and Joe Sotelo didn\u2019t give up after Biden rejected their application. Instead, advocates turned to help from Alice Marie Johnson<\/a>, whom Trump recently tapped as his pardon czar after commuting her sentence for federal drug and money laundering charges in 2018.<\/p>\n

It was Johnson who intervened on behalf of the brothers, who had been serving life prison terms for a drug-trafficking conspiracy, said Brittany Barnett, founder of the Buried Alive Project, a nonprofit advocacy group that took up the Sotelos\u2019 case. The brothers were freed late last month. <\/p>\n

Johnson \u201cknows firsthand the weight of a life sentence,\u201d Barnett said. \u201cThese men were serving the same sentence as the Unabomber<\/a> \u2014 on drug charges.\u201d <\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s open-mindedness has sent \u201cshock waves of hope through the prison walls for the thousands of people still serving extreme sentences,\u201d Barnett said.<\/p>\n

No commutation seems out of the question in prisons like FCI Ashland, the Kentucky lockup where Scott, the former DEA agent, has been held nearly four years.<\/p>\n

Scott, 57, was exercising in March with Brian Kelsey, when the former Tennessee state senator received word he had been pardoned<\/a> just two weeks into a 21-month sentence for campaign finance fraud. Kelsey called his release a \u201cvictory for every American who believes in one impartial justice system for all.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last month, the president pardoned another former Ashland prisoner, P.G. Sittenfeld, a former Cincinnati city councilman who not only won office as a Democrat but sharply criticized Trump. It is unclear why Trump pardoned Sittenfeld, who also seemed surprised by the grant of clemency. \u201cI was as stunned as I suspect you were,\u201d he wrote supporters this month, according to the Cincinnati Business Courier. <\/p>\n

In his own application for a commutation, Scott sought to draw Trump\u2019s attention not only to his ear wound \u2014 sustained in a shooting that predated his law enforcement career \u2014 but also the prosecutor who handled his case. That prosecutor went on to work for special counsel Jack Smith<\/a>, whose team twice indicted Trump. The charges were dropped after Trump won the November election.<\/p>\n

\u201cThough I do not claim to be a saint, I DID NOT commit the crimes for which I have been convicted,\u201d Scott wrote to the president, even using all caps like Trump does on social media.<\/p>\n

Scott had been among the most prolific narcotics agents<\/a> in the country during his 17-year career at the DEA and won several awards for his work.<\/p>\n

His downfall began in 2016, when two members of his New Orleans-based task force were arrested for stealing and using drugs, prompting a yearslong FBI inquiry. A federal jury convicted Scott<\/a> in 2019 of orchestrating false testimony against a trafficker. He also was found guilty of falsifying DEA paperwork to acquire a pickup truck and, following a separate trial, stealing money and property from suspects. <\/p>\n

Scheduled for release in 2031, he has exhausted every possible appeal. Clemency from Trump, Scott told the AP, is his \u201clast resort.\u201d<\/p>\n

By all accounts, Scott has been a model prisoner and has been awarded sought-after privileges. He spends his days as FCI Ashland\u2019s \u201ctown driver,\u201d chauffeuring newly released prisoners to bus stops, halfway houses, hospitals and doctors\u2019 offices in nearby cities.<\/p>\n

And he has participated in a program called Pawsibilities Unleashed, in which he raises and trains service and therapy dogs behind bars.<\/p>\n

He named one of his most recent canines, a Labradane, Trump.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

Follow the AP’s coverage of President Donald Trump at https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/donald-trump<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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