Trump Ignites Backlash After Granting Full Pardon to Ex-Convict During RNC Convention: ‘Like It’s a Rose on an Episode of The Bachelor‘

President Donald Trump used the platform of his party’s primetime convention to grant a full pardon to a former felon, Jon Ponder, taking the unprecedented step of linking an act of clemency with a presidential campaign.

Trump’s primetime pardon of Ponder, who was convicted of robbing a bank and has since started a prisoner re-entery program,  belies his record-low use of presidential clemency. In fact, Trump has granted the fewest clemencies since President Jimmy Carter, just 37 including the pardon of Jon Ponder during the RNC on Tuesday night. By comparison, the next lowest was President George H.W. Bush, who in his one term of office granted 77 clemencies. President Barack Obama had, by far, given out the most clemencies since 1976 with 1,927, although a great man of them came as he was leaving office.

In addition, Trump’s granting of a pardon comes on the same day that former DHS official Miles Taylor claimed that Trump promised to pardon any border officials who broke the law to keep undocumented aliens out of the country.

But it was the breaking of yet another norm and the reality-TV, game show nature of the granting of a single pardon, to a man who highly praised him on primetime TV, that set many people off.

is trump giving out a federal pardon like its a rose on an episode of the bachelor?

— b-boy bouiebaisse (@jbouie) August 26, 2020

Next he will have 3 people up for a pardon — but only one can be pardoned — and have people vote by phone on who gets the pardon. #RNC2020

— Michelangelo Signorile, subscribe to my newsletter (@MSignorile) August 26, 2020

That was, uh, unusual. The president issuing a pardon during a political convention. #RNC2020 pic.twitter.com/KxRxYJzEzn

— Jim Roberts (@nycjim) August 26, 2020

Pardons are for sale at RNC convention. Bid now and get a set of steak knives.

— Joe Lockhart (@joelockhart) August 26, 2020

Using an official act— no matter how well deserved or rich in merit— for a purely partisan end is corrupt.

— Anthony Michael Kreis (@AnthonyMKreis) August 26, 2020

I’m going to go out on a limb and say no president has ever used his pardon power during a partisan political convention. Until now.

— James Hohmann (@jameshohmann) August 26, 2020

Trump is using a presidential pardon as a reelection ploy

— Molly Jong-Fast? (@MollyJongFast) August 26, 2020

I’m glad this guy got a pardon, but using the pardon power to make a magnanimous display of televised royal grace as a campaign stunt during a party convention is profoundly degrading to the office. Which is why I thought Trump was going to do it the second I saw them together. https://t.co/do085lzNCs

— Will Wilkinson ? (@willwilkinson) August 26, 2020

There is no doubt Jon Ponder deserves the pardon he got tonight. It’s too bad he had to be used as a political prop to get it.

— Joe Lockhart (@joelockhart) August 26, 2020

Perfectly appropriate and right for POTUS to pardon a worthy person. Absolutely wrong to do it as part of #RepublicanNationalConvention

— Charlie Dent (@RepCharlieDent) August 26, 2020

This is absurd and irresponsible, NYT. “Tradition-breaking?” That’s the harshest criticism you have here? Also, handing out a pardon like its a fucking game show isn’t normal. pic.twitter.com/gg45I0eJZW

— Parker Molloy (@ParkerMolloy) August 26, 2020

Trump is going to need a pardon for signing a pardon in the middle of a political convention.

— Dan Pfeiffer (@danpfeiffer) August 26, 2020

The RNC is infused with the illegal and unethical use of everything from the White House to the presidential pardon power to the Secretary of State on official travel. Like the Trump presidency, it’s a criminal enterprise with the American people picking up the bill.

— Ben Rhodes (@brhodes) August 26, 2020

Norms being broken in RNC tonight:

— White House being used as backdrop for convention speeches/videos
— Secretary of State delivering a speech
— President signing an official action (Ponder pardon) as part of convention programming

— Gabe Fleisher (@WakeUp2Politics) August 26, 2020

Yes, it’s totally normal for a president to stage photo-ops at a National Convention where freed prisoners praise him as he speaks positively about war criminals and then pardons people as a B-segment.

Nothing bizarre and dictator-like about any of that.

— Jared Yates Sexton (@JYSexton) August 26, 2020

 

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