When President Trump “pardons” a pair of Thanksgiving turkeys on Tuesday, prisoners will be watching and hoping that Trump breaks with tradition and frees human beings alongside lucky birds.
This year, optimism is fueled by signs that the White House and Justice Department are processing clemency requests, as Trump denounces perceived unfairness in criminal sentencing and vows to release more inmates.
Last week, Trump endorsed legislation that would reduce some drug-crime penalties, after saying in October that “a lot of people” are jailed for “no reason” and that he was “actively looking” for inmates to release.
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Trump’s words have generated enormous enthusiasm in prisons ahead of the annual Rose Garden turkey pardon.
“I fall into the category of people who are taking up precious bed space in an overcrowded prison ‘for no good reason,'” said Michael Pelletier, who is serving life without parole for importing marijuana from Canada into Maine — two jurisdictions that since legalized recreational pot.
“I am a paraplegic, serving a life sentence for pot. I’m not a threat to society,” Pelletier told the Washington Examiner in an email from prison. “I’d love to vacate this cell and wheel out of here and into the arms of a large and loving family who are tired of getting their hopes up, only to be disappointed.”
“I’m all in. Hope is all I got left,” he said.
Like much of his presidency, Trump’s clemency review process has been unconventional. Former White House counsel Don McGahn invited an outside policy advocate to assemble lists of worthy inmates, which were hand-delivered in June to McGahn and Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and adviser.
Additional lists have flowed into the West Wing, including from anti-abortion evangelical leader Alveda King. When Trump invited NFL players to submit names, a former player turned agent requested early release for his nephew in a letter.
Trump has used his constitutional clemency powers nine times, a generous early-term streak compared to recent predecessors. His most recent grants, on July 10, went to Oregon ranchers Steven and Dwight Hammond, who set fires that spread onto federal land.
Trump released the Hammonds from prison using full pardons. It is believed to be the first time since the 1800s that a currently jailed person was pardoned, leading to initial questions about whether a White House statement used inaccurate terminology.
Most of Trump’s clemency grants have gone to people recommended by political allies or celebrities. He posthumously pardoned the boxer Jack Johnson in May upon the request of “Rocky” actor Sylvester Stallone, and pardoned former Dick Cheney aide I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby in April, despite not being personally close to Libby.
A pivotal moment for outside advocates came in June, when Trump commuted the prison sentence of drug convict Alice Johnson, long advocated for by the CAN-DO Foundation before her cause attracted the attention of celebrity Kim Kardashian West, who visited the Oval Office to argue for her release.
Kardashian West returned to the Oval Office in September to discuss a commutation for Chris Young, a 30-year-old arrested at 22 and sentenced to life for drug crimes. During the visit, Trump on his own brought up Matthew Charles, who returned to jail this year after a court found his drug sentence was reduced in error.
It’s been four months since Trump gave anyone clemency, in what is widely believed to be a pause for the midterm elections, when Trump crisscrossed the nation on behalf of Republican candidates. Now, though, aspirants are excited about benefiting from Trump’s enthusiasm.
“Each year we watch a turkey pardoned and given a second chance to roam about freely. If my fiance David Barren was given the opportunity to be pardoned this Thanksgiving and reintegrate into society as a free man, it would be life-altering for us both,” said Anrica Caldwell, vice president of the CAN-DO Foundation.
Barren, whose drug-dealing life sentence was shortened by President Barack Obama to end in 2034, said that “clemency would be an opportunity to sit at the Thanksgiving table with my family,” including his parents, who are in their 80s. “I would like to be given one more opportunity to thank them for being there during those moments that I’ve needed them the most,” he said.
Chad Marks, who is 16 years into a 40-year sentence for drug conspiracy, said, “I pray President Trump will find me worthy this year by pardoning both me and other men and women who need relief. Carrying on the tradition of pardoning a turkey is OK, but hopeful I can also walk free with the turkey.”
Kristian Saucier, the second person to receive a pardon from Trump, told the Washington Examiner the effects of Trump’s clemency have been life-changing.
“Having a pardon has improved my quality of life dramatically,” said Saucier, a young father who worked as a garbage man before he was pardoned in March. Saucier pleaded guilty to taking six photos inside a nuclear submarine when he was 22 years old and was sentenced to a year in prison during the 2016 campaign, in a case Trump frequently compared with the unprosecuted mishandling of classified information by Hillary Clinton on a private email server.
“I think, fundamentally, what the pardon has done is it has given me back a sense of faith in the system, that someone cares about the average person,” said Saucier, who now works in engineering and sales for a company that specializes in boiler control systems.
Shortly after receiving a pardon, Saucier gave his two weeks notice as a garbage man. The company asked him to work a third week, and he did, grateful that they hired him out of prison. But at the new job, he was denied access to a military installation for work, due to his conviction. Now, he carries a printed copy of the pardon proclamation wherever he goes.
As both the White House and Justice Department Office of the Pardon Attorney move forward on cases, it’s unclear how much coordination there is. Clemency advocates want an in-house White House clemency review process, arguing the OPA’s process is beholden to prosecutors given a voice in recommendations. But the OPA, long considered an office where applications go to die, appears to have received recent marching orders.
“They are processing cases, but it’s just not clear to me that the longstanding umbilical cord between the Department of Justice and White House is operational at this time,” said Margaret Love, U.S. pardon attorney from 1990 to 1997.
Love, who now represents pardon applicants, said the OPA is acknowledging new applications, sending out screening letters asking for additional information, and authorizing FBI background investigations — the three stages of review that an applicant’s attorney would know about.
Although the recent action has not yet translated into additional clemency grants, Love said, “It is my hope that this process gets back on track as a routine program of the presidency, as it was until the recent past.”
Amy Ralston Povah, the founder of the CAN-DO Foundation, said giving clemency could send a political message, too, allowing Trump to communicate his displeasure with and circumvent Senate Republicans such as Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., who are resisting the Trump-supported First Step Act, which would reduce many new prison sentences.
“Now is the perfect opportunity for President Trump to show Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell who’s the boss,” Povah said. “If McConnell is going to break his promise to bring the First Step Act to the floor for a vote, then President Trump should consider extending relief to the many men and women in prison anxiously awaiting relief with his executive clemency power. He can commute the sentences of hundreds, if not thousands of prisoners who would qualify for an immediate release if First Step passes with one stroke of the pen.”
