Biden gave 80 full pardons. The other 4165 were commutations.
The difference is that a full pardon effectively negates the conviction (or prevents conviction if granted to someone not yet convicted). Any rights lost due to the felony conviction such as voting rights, firearm rights, holding some public offices, and such are restored.
A commutation merely reduces the sentence, sometimes to time already served so that the person is immediately released, and sometimes to a lesser sentence but not on that will result in earlier release (e.g., a President could commute a death sentence to life without parole). It does not restore any rights that were lost due to the felony conviction.
Most of Biden's commutations were for non-violent drug possession, with a large fraction of those being for marijuana. Many of these were for cases that nowadays would not even have been prosecuted.
Compare to Trump. Almost 1600 of his were full pardons for January 6 people. Only 14 of them were commutations, which were to time served.
Right, in the grand tradition of Bill Clinton pardoning Marc Rich in exchange for large donations. I'm not attempting to defend Trump's pardons but abuse of that power is clearly a persistent bipartisan problem.
Biden and Obama pardons were done by setting criteria (non-violent drug offenders mainly who got caught up in three strikes nonsense, serving huge sentences) and applying the criteria broadly. Trump is targeting specific folks who are contributing to his cause. Tai Lopez has very little chance under a Democratic presidency, per hard data. He has a decent chance under Trump if he can buy enough trump coin and say some flattering things about Trump, per hard data.
If those numbers are accurate, Trump is already averaging more than Biden per year. That could obviously fluctuate but he's on course to double Biden's Pardons/Month numbers
tzs|5 months ago
The difference is that a full pardon effectively negates the conviction (or prevents conviction if granted to someone not yet convicted). Any rights lost due to the felony conviction such as voting rights, firearm rights, holding some public offices, and such are restored.
A commutation merely reduces the sentence, sometimes to time already served so that the person is immediately released, and sometimes to a lesser sentence but not on that will result in earlier release (e.g., a President could commute a death sentence to life without parole). It does not restore any rights that were lost due to the felony conviction.
Most of Biden's commutations were for non-violent drug possession, with a large fraction of those being for marijuana. Many of these were for cases that nowadays would not even have been prosecuted.
Compare to Trump. Almost 1600 of his were full pardons for January 6 people. Only 14 of them were commutations, which were to time served.
collingreen|5 months ago
jmull|5 months ago
It appears Trump gives pardons to allies, and one straight forward way to become his ally is send him money.
nradov|5 months ago
hcknwscommenter|5 months ago
calvinmorrison|5 months ago
Obama pardoned his close advisor who lied to the FBI
Clinton pardoned Marc Rich - fugitive who's exwife donated lots of money to the clinton Presidential Library or something.
Grant pardoned his own private secretary
Truman pardoned his own yokel local union mobsters from KC
etc
b00ty4breakfast|5 months ago
unknown|5 months ago
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