Attorney General Jeff Sessions, in testimony in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee, wouldn’t say whether it would be appropriate for a President to preemptively pardon people who are of interest to a federal investigation.
That scenario is a hot topic in light of Special Counsel Bob Mueller’s Russia probe, as President Trump has reportedly asked advisers about his abilities to pardon himself and those close to him, and Mueller’s team has appeared to take measures to circumvent that possibility, by working with the New York state attorney general’s office. (Presidents can only pardon federal crimes, not state crimes.)
After bringing up that Sessions had previously refused to say whether he had discussed potential pardons for people implicated by the Russia investigation, Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) posed the question to Sessions as a hypothetical.
“Broadly speaking, do you believe that it would be problematic for an ongoing investigation if a president were to preemptively issue a pardon for someone who we have reason to believe is of interest to that investigation before the special counsel had a chance to finish his work?” Klobuchar asked.
“Well, the pardon power is quite broad. I’m not studied it. I do not know if that would be appropriate or not, frankly,” Sessions said. He later added that he would look into it and follow up with a written response to the committee.
Sessions clearly doesn’t know anything, maybe he should just resign.
Given that Trump has speculated about this, it is highly improbable that the has never thought about it, nor looked into it.
“He later added that he would look into it and follow up with a written response to the committee.”
The check is in the mail.
For someone who is supposed to be the country’s top legal/judicial expert, Sessions sure doesn’t know much . . . . .He’s either lying, forgetful or, if he’s actually telling the truth, too incompetent to hold his position.
When speaking about Presidential pardon power, ‘appropriate’ is a word with no meaning or legal significance.
Art 2, Para 1 of the Constitution makes the power very broad,
The President…shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for
Offenses against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.
That’s it. That’s all the Constitution says on the subject.
The POTUS alone and in her or his sole discretion decides what is appropriate. And pardons have been used offensively by past Presidents. Most recently, President G.H.W. Bush pardoned Casper Weinberger and 5 others on the eve of trial to stop the Iran Contra prosecution dead in it’s tracks and no one really seemed to much care.
Plenty of Presidential pardons have been unseemly (Clinton’s pardon of Marc Rich comes to mind) but as a legal matter, there’s no real limits (except in the case of impeachment), and any one who tells you otherwise is just engaging in navel gazing and wishful thinking.
If Trump pardons pretty much everyone including family (and he surely will), as a republic we have the power to not give him a second term assuming first term pardons and he even runs, and that’s pretty much it.