Donald Trump will not been granting clemency to himself, his children, or his personal attorney Rudy Giuliani after months of speculation.
On Tuesday night, the outgoing president granted clemency to former White House aide Steve Bannon as part as part of a wave of pardons and commutations issued during his final hours in office.
In total, the full list of recipients was said to be 143. Trump, however, did not name himself among those being pardoned, nor did he name any of his children.
White House advisers had reportedly cautioned Trump against a self-pardon over the last few months because they believed it would make him look guilty of something.
Trump, who officially leaves office later today, appeared to heed their warnings.
There was also no pardon for his lawyer Rudy Giuliani, who was at the forefront of Trump’s unsuccessful efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. Giuliani has not been charged with a crime, but investigators have been probing his activities in Ukraine.
A number of other high-profile names who were expected to be considered for clemency were also missing from the list. Those included Julian Assange, Edward Snowden and Tiger King’s Joe Exotic.
On Tuesday night, the outgoing president granted clemency to former White House aide Steve Bannon as part as part of a wave of pardons and commutations he will issue during his final hours in office.
Trump, however, did not name himself among those being pardoned, nor did he name any of his children
Bannon (left), who was a key adviser in Trump’s 2016 presidential run, was pardoned Tuesday. Giuliani (right), Trump’s personal attorney, has not been pardoned
Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, was not expected to get a pardon, according to Reuters.
The U.S. Justice Department in 2019 asked Britain to extradite Assange to the United States to face charges that he conspired to hack U.S. government computers and violated an espionage law.
A British judge ruled two weeks ago Assange should not be extradited to the United States, saying his mental health problems meant he would be at risk of suicide.
His partner Stella Moris had previously urged the Department of Justice to ‘to drop the charges and the President of the United States to pardon Julian.’
The 49-year-old is wanted to face an 18-count indictment, alleging a plot to hack computers and a conspiracy to obtain and disclose national defense information.
The US Government has formally lodged an appeal against the decision to block Assange’s extradition.
Also not in line for a commutation was Joseph Maldonado-Passage, better known as Joe Exotic. He has served roughly two years of a 22-year sentence after he was convicted on 17 federal charges in 2019 for animal abuse and an attempted murder-for-hire plot on fellow exotic cat owner Carole Baskin.
Exotic’s team, seemingly anticipating his imminent release, reportedly had a limo ready from a Fort Worth prison to immediately get his hair done before seeing his husband Dillon Passage.
Star of the Netflix series Joe Exotic, who is in jail as part of a murder-for-hire plot, did not receive clemency despite his appeals to the president
Also missing from the list was Wikileaks founder Julian Assange and Edward Snowden
Joe Biden will be sworn in as Trump’s White House successor on Wednesday.
Ahead of his departure, Trump pardoned rappers Lil Wayne and Kodak Black who were prosecuted on federal weapons offenses, as well as former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, who was serving a 28-year prison term on corruption charges, a senior administration official said.
Lil Wayne, 38, whose real name is Dwayne Michael Carter Jr., pleaded guilty in federal court in December to illegally possessing a firearm and faced up to 10 years in prison. He has expressed support for Trump’s criminal justice reform efforts.
Kodak Black, 23, who was born Bill Kahan Kapri, is in federal prison for making a false statement in order to buy a firearm.
Trump also granted clemency to Casey Urlacher, brother of former NFL star Brian Urlacher, who pleaded not guilty in March to charges that he helped run an illegal offshore gambling ring.
Sholam Weiss, who was convicted of bilking $125 million from the National Heritage Life Insurance Co and its elderly policyholders, was pardoned. He fled the United States and was sentenced in absentia in 2000 to 845 years in prison, but he was eventually extradited from Austria.
Weiss, 66, is at a U.S. penitentiary in Pennsylvania, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons. Trump lawyers from his first impeachment, Alan Dershowitz and Jay Sekulow, sent letters to the White House in support of Weiss.
Former Google engineer Anthony Levandowski too received a presidential pardon from Trump.
Levandowski pleaded guilty to stealing secret technology related to self-driving cars from Google before becoming the head of Uber Technologies Inc’s rival unit.
In August, a judge in San Francisco sentenced Levandowski to 18 months in prison but said he could enter custody once the COVID-19 pandemic has subsided.
The judge, William Alsup, who has been involved in Silicon Valley litigation for nearly five decades, described Levandowski’s conviction as the ‘biggest trade secret crime I have ever seen.’
Ahead of his departure, Trump also pardoned rapper Lil Wayne, who pleaded guilty in federal court in December to illegally possessing a firearm
Former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, who was serving a 28-year prison term on corruption charges was granted clemency
Bannon, who was a key adviser in Trump’s 2016 presidential run, was pardoned also. He was charged last year with swindling Trump supporters over an effort to raise private funds to build the president’s wall on the U.S.-Mexico border, but pleaded not guilty.
White House officials had advised Trump against pardoning Bannon. The two men have lately rekindled their relationship as Trump sought support for his unproven claims of voter fraud, an official familiar with the situation said.
Bannon, 67, is the latest prominent political ally to receive clemency from Trump, who has often used the powers of the executive branch to reward loyalists and punish his enemies.
Trump previously pardoned former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn for lying to the FBI about his conversation with the former Russian ambassador, and he commuted the prison term for Roger Stone, who was convicted of lying to Congress during its investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.
Bannon can still be charged in state court in New York, where a pardon would not help him, said Daniel R. Alonso, a former prosecutor now at the Buckley law firm. Fraud prosecutions are frequently brought by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, Alonso said.