President Trump may wait to decide on issuing pardons for several members of the military accused of war crimes until after their trials.
Trump faced pushback after a New York Times report said he was considering issuing pardons for the accused war criminals near Memorial Day ahead of their trials. Trump contradicted the report on Friday and suggested he would wait until after the trials before considering pardons.
“We are looking at a lot of different pardons for a lot of different people. Some of these soldiers are people that have fought hard, long. You know, we teach them how to be great fighters, and then when they fight, sometimes they get really treated very unfairly. So we’re going to take a look at it,” Trump told reporters.
“I haven’t done anything yet. I haven’t made any decisions. There’s two or three of them right now. It’s a little bit controversial. It’s very possible that I’ll let the trials go on and I’ll make my decision after the trial,” Trump said.
Rep. Dan Crenshaw, R-Texas, a former Navy SEAL, urged Trump to reconsider preemptive pardons for the alleged war criminals.
“These cases should be decided by the courts, where the entirety of the evidence can be viewed. Only after that should a pardon be considered,” Crenshaw told National Review.
Navy SEAL Special Operations Chief Edward Gallagher and Army Green Beret Maj. Mathew Golsteyn are two of the servicemen Trump is reportedly considering pardoning. Gallagher is facing roughly a dozen charges, including premeditated and attempted murder and obstruction of justice. His trial is scheduled to begin May 28.
Golsteyn told the CIA he killed a suspected Taliban bomb-maker in 2010 and is charged with committing premeditated murder.
[Read more: These are the service members who could get ‘war crimes’ pardons from Trump]
