President Trump on Wednesday pardoned Lord Conrad Black, a larger-than-life Canadian-born British former newspaper magnate.
Black, the former owner of the Daily Telegraph, was convicted in 2007 of fraud and obstruction of justice. He spent three-and-a-half years in prison, despite the Supreme Court overturning charges in his case, and was deported to his native Canada after he was released in 2012. He was banned from returning to the U.S. for 30 years.
“An entrepreneur and scholar, Lord Black has made tremendous contributions to business, as well as to political and historical thought,” the White House said in a statement.
White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said “many high-profile individuals” had “vigorously vouched for his exceptional character,” including former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, Elton John, Rush Limbaugh, and the late William F. Buckley Jr.
The statement did not mention Black’s 2018 book Donald J. Trump: A President Like No Other or that he had written other glowing articles about the president. Trump and Black originally partnered on building Trump Tower in Chicago, but Trump later bought Black’s share.
Black, a colorful figure with a gravelly voice and imposing demeanor, is a conservative but sees himself as a news man. He is known for giving his editors plenty of latitude, and on occasion wrote letters to his own newspapers to disagree with their editorials. Black also wrote biographies of Presidents Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Richard M. Nixon, and a 2012 memoir, along with other works.
Before he went to prison his inner circle included Kissinger, former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker, former Reagan official Richard Perle, columnist George Will, and Jimmy Carter’s national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski, many of whom were paid to serve on an advisory board for his publishing company, Hollinger International.
Trump called Black, 74, last week to share news of the pardon, the media mogul wrote Wednesday.
“When my assistant said there was a call from the White House, I picked up, said ‘Hello’ and started to ask if this was a prank (suspecting my friends in the British tabloid media), but the caller spoke politely over me: ‘Please hold for the president,’” he wrote.
“He could not have been more gracious and quickly got to his point: he was granting me a full pardon that would ‘Expunge the bad wrap you got.’”
Hollinger International, which owned the Daily Telegraph, the Jerusalem Post and the Chicago Sun-Times, suffered a steep decline after Black was ousted in 2004 amid allegations that he misused company funds.
