https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/trump-presidential-pardon-process-dda97c15Inside the New Fast Track to a Presidential PardonLobbyists close to Trump say their going rate to advocate for a pardon is $1 millionPresident Trump had just awarded a posthumous Presidential Medal of Freedom for Charlie Kirk in October when his son ushered friends toward the Oval Office.As a string ensemble played in the background, Donald Trump Jr. walked up with lobbyist Ches McDowell to chat with the president. Trump Jr. at one point pulled McDowell forward to shake the president’s hand, according to a livestream broadcast. After they went inside, McDowell took the president aside to discuss a pressing issue, according to people familiar with the matter: One of his clients was seeking a pardon.The client was Changpeng Zhao, founder of the world’s largest crypto exchange, Binance. That afternoon, the president agreed to sign Zhao’s pardon, the people said.Zhao was one of the beneficiaries of a new, informal path to presidential pardons that has become a feature of Trump’s second term, which allows some clemency applicants with deep pockets or politically connected lobbyists to circumvent the traditional pardon process.McDowell told The Wall Street Journal that Trump Jr. didn’t help him pursue the pardon and had left the room when he brought up Zhao. Trump Jr. had brought him because they were leaving later that afternoon for a hunting trip in Utah, McDowell said. A spokesman for Trump Jr. declined to comment.
The president formally signed the pardon for Zhao a week later, setting off an uproar in Washington. Democrats—pointing to steps Binance has taken that boosted the cryptocurrency company that Trump Jr. co-founded along with his father and brothers, World Liberty Financial—said the move amounted to brazen corruption. Several Republicans, including Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina and Trump donor Joe Lonsdale, said they were alarmed by it. Trump ally Laura Loomer called it a “terrible Pardon idea.”For Binance, it was the culmination of a nearly yearlong effort to pursue clemency for its founder. It had paid lobbyists around $800,000 to lobby for a pardon, U.S. policy changes and other matters, according to federal records. It also approached other lobbyists about a pardon, offering success fees of as much as $5 million if they could help secure one, according to people familiar with the outreach. The company pleaded guilty in 2023 to violating anti-money-laundering rules and paid a $4.3 billion fine, and Zhao served a four-month prison sentence on a related charge. A pardon could make it easier for the company to return to the U.S. market.Tom Clare, a lawyer for World Liberty Financial, said the firm played no role in Zhao’s pursuit of a pardon and that Trump Jr. and his brother don’t serve on the board or engage in the day-to-day management of World Liberty Financial. The company “did not discuss, facilitate or influence” Zhao’s pardon, he said. All interactions between World Liberty Financial and Binance have been “routine,” he said.A lawyer for Zhao, Teresa Goody Guillén, said that his pardon wasn’t linked to any business decision and that he was “pardoned for justice.” A Binance representative said the company had “limited involvement” with World Liberty Financial-related products that was “confined to contractual terms that are available to other projects.”
Trump is a Catholic church raised by Maga. Selling pardons and molesting boys and covering it up, what else they have in common?
The clemency for Zhao was one in a series of pardons in recent months that have surprised even some of the president’s closest advisers. This month alone, Trump pardoned a former Honduran president, Juan Orlando Hernández, who had been convicted of conspiring with cartels to ship 400 tons of cocaine to the U.S.; a Texas Democrat, Henry Cuellar, charged with taking nearly $600,000 in foreign bribes; and a sports executive, Tim Leiweke, who had been indicted by Trump’s own Justice Department. The men have previously denied wrongdoing. Trump pardoned Hernández so quickly that White House chief of staff Susie Wiles and other senior officials had no advance notice—and even Roger Stone, a longtime Trump ally who had been pushing for the pardon, told people he was stunned by Trump’s speed. Stone said he wasn’t paid for his advocacy, which he said came after he had reviewed the case.Trump had asked aides for months if Cuellar would flip to the Republican Party if he pardoned him, according to people familiar with the conversations. He hasn’t switched parties. Trump’s pardon for Leiweke came after former Rep. Trey Gowdy raised the case with him at Mar-a-Lago after a round of golf, the Journal previously reported. The president, Gowdy told the Journal, had asked if there was anything he needed.Trump himself has suggested that he doesn’t spend too much time on the particulars of a case if he is persuaded that someone was unfairly targeted. “I know very little about him,” he said of Hernández in an interview with Politico. “They think he was treated horribly, and they asked me to do it.”Liz Oyer, the Justice Department’s former pardon attorney who was fired in March, said Trump’s approach subverted what the pardon process was designed for. The president “appears to be considering political, personal and financial interests and not the interests of the American public,” she said.
>>1469725I'll never forgive Trump for pardoning a fucking Canadian. Literally the worst thing he's done is pardon that fucking Canadian fuck, Zhao.
Of course trump accusing others of Pay to Play is a confession.
>>1469725>Democrats—pointing to steps Binance has taken that boosted the cryptocurrency company that Trump Jr. co-founded along with his father and brothers, World Liberty Financial—said the move amounted to brazen corruption.And were oddly silent about Hunter Biden and Burisma... by the way how much did that blanket pardon cost?
>>1469749Trump proved Biden was right to hand out every pardon he did the second he went after Letitia James for daring to hold him accountable to the law and James Comey for... I don't even know why Trump hates Comey, the fucker handed him 2016 on a silver platter he should be sending him "Thank You" baskets every week.
>>1469751>It's only okay when WE do it!
>>1469753Yes, you memorized the RNC's catchphrase for the last 40 years, very good
>>1469725A million dollars for a whole-ass presidential pardon? Christ, if you're going to be a corrupt fuckhead can you at least not be cheap over it? Fucking Dr. Evil over here.
>>1469749>Hunter BidenSomeone forgot to update one of the bots
>>1469793Someone forgot how to make a counter-argument.
>>1469801You're a faggot and there's nothing to argue
