Former President Obama made good on his promise to cut jail times of convicts, breaking every modern record for commuting sentences, according to a new report from the U.S. Sentencing Commission.
For the record, Obama handed out 1,928 grants of clemency during his presidency. “Of them, 1,716 were commutations of sentence, more commutations than any other president has granted,” said the report.
In modern era, only former President Johnson’s commutations came close. But at just 226, it is a fraction of Obama’s.
However, some presidents granted more full pardons than Obama.
Both were goals of the administration. Near the end of his two year term, for example, he tasked a group to find cases he could consider.
Key findings from the new report:
- President Obama made 1,928 grants of clemency during his presidency. Of them, 1,716 were commutations of sentence, more commutations than any other President has granted.
- Of the 1,928 grants of clemency that President Obama made, 1,696 were sentence commutations under the 2014 Clemency Initiative.
- The commutations in sentence granted through the Clemency Initiative resulted in an average sentence reduction of 39.0 percent, or approximately 140 months.
- Of the 1,696 offenders who received a commuted sentence under the Clemency Initiative, 86 (5.1%) met all the announced Clemency Initiative factors for consideration.
- On April 24, 2014, there were 1,025 drug trafficking offenders incarcerated in the Federal Bureau of Prisons who appeared to meet all the announced Clemency Initiative factors. Of them, 54 (5.3%) received clemency from President Obama.
- By January 19, 2017, there were 2,687 drug trafficking offenders who had been incarcerated in the Federal Bureau of Prisons when the Clemency Initiative was announced and who appeared to meet all the announced Clemency Initiative factors. Of them, 92 (3.4%) received clemency from President Obama.
Paul Bedard, the Washington Examiner’s “Washington Secrets” columnist, can be contacted at [email protected]
