President Trump[1] raised eyebrows Thursday with an unorthodox use of his pardon power, letting filmmaker Dinesh D’Souza off the hook for campaign finance violations and suggesting reprieves for two more celebrity convicts: former Illinois Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich and lifestyle maven Martha Stewart.
Mr. Trump[2] has used his power to grant clemency — one of the most absolute authorities a president possesses — in an unusual manner: by scanning TV and newspaper headlines and selecting cases where he sees injustice and then delivering his own brand of presidential mercy.
But the freewheeling use of clemency, though within his constitutional authority, is fueling suspicion on the left that Mr. Trump[3] is merely warming up his pardon pen for allies caught up in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election.
One constitutional scholar has even cited impeachment as a potential remedy for abuse of the Oval Office’s power to issue pardons.
Mr. Trump[4] said he didn’t have a personal relationship with Mr. D’Souza but knew about his case and thought he got a raw deal. “Nobody asked me to do it,” Mr. Trump[5] told reporters traveling with him on Air Force One. “I’ve always felt he was very unfairly treated.”
Mr. D’Souza pleaded guilty in 2014 to making an illegal campaign contribution to New York politician Went Long. He was sentenced to five years of probation, eight months in a halfway house and a $30,000 fine.
Conservatives said the charges were the Obama administration[6]’s political payback for Mr. D’Souza’s films that ripped President Obama and the Democratic Party.
The pardon spurred howls on the left.
Floating clemency for Blagojevich and Ms. Stewart, however, was startling....
“I have no idea why Blagojevich and Stewart are on the president’s radar,” said Andrew Rudalevige, a scholar of presidential powers at Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine. “But, the presidential pardon power is one of the few Article II powers that is not checked by the other branches, in part because it is itself a potential check on the courts.”Regarding Blagojevich, who is serving 14 years for corruption as governor, including trying to “sell” an appointment to a vacant Senate seat, Mr. Trump[7] said the prison sentence was too long.“Plenty of other politicians have said a lot worse. He shouldn’t have been put in jail,” Mr. Trump[8] said. “And he’s a Democrat. He’s not my party. But I thought that he was treated unfairly.”Mr. Trump[9] has links to both Blagojevich and Ms. Stewart, although neither is considered close or politically allied with the president.Blagojevich was a contestant on Mr. Trump[10]’s reality TV show “The Apprentice.”Ms. Stewart starred in a spinoff of “The Apprentice.” She was prosecuted in 2004 by U.S. Attorney James B. Comey, who went on to become FBI director until