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Ed Martin's peculiar view of pardon power
Trump's pardon attorney is very confused about how pardons work.
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Let’s get one thing straight: Ed Martin, President Donald Trump’s pardon attorney, is a buffoon.
In a normal administration, Martin wouldn’t have any job, much less the power to recommend to the literal President of the United States who deserves to have the consequences of their criminal conviction set aside or be protected from future prosecution.
But in this administration, regrettably, Martin makes perfect sense. He’s a two-bit political operative with extremely limited legal experience and a complete lack of ethics.
This isn’t a story about Ed Martin as such, though, as Martin is really just a very useful tool for Trump to reward cronies, donors, and his most loyal stormtroopers.
But what if some of those true believers cannot receive the gift of Trump’s mercy because they were prosecuted in a state rather than federally? Enter Ed! Since Martin neither knows what he’s doing or cares whether it’s legal, he’s perfectly willing to float the most unconstitutional trial balloons, such as “Trump could just pardon people for state crimes if he wants to” and “former President Biden’s pardons can be reversed.”
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Let’s unpack that state crimes one, shall we?
Presidents cannot pardon people for state crimes, nor protect them from being charged by a state for future crimes. Period. There’s no wiggle room here. Don’t believe it? OK, well, let’s mosey on over to the DOJ’s Office of the Pardon Attorney’s FAQ page:
Does the President have authority to grant clemency for a state conviction?
No. The President’s clemency power is conferred by Article II, Section 2, Clause 1 of the Constitution of the United States, which provides: “The President … shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offenses against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.” The President’s authority to grant clemency is limited to federal offenses and offenses prosecuted by the United States Attorney for the District of Columbia in the name of the United States in the DC Superior Court. An offense that violates a state law is not an offense against the United States. A person who wishes to seek a pardon or a commutation of sentence for a state offense should contact the authorities of the state in which the conviction occurred. Such state authorities are typically the governor or a state board of pardons and/or paroles, if the state government has created such a board.
We can probably rest assured that Martin didn’t write this, doesn’t know it’s there, and that if anyone finds it, the administration will simply solve any problems that arise by deleting it from the website. That’s their favorite trick for making problematic things disappear, an unsurprising tactic for an administration stuffed with people who lack object permanence. Yes, if we can no longer see it on your website, surely it no longer exists or has the force of law!
This is how toddlers think, tucked under a blanket, thinking that if they can’t see you, you can’t see them.
That pesky little FAQ, you’ll see, quotes the part of the Constitution that completely trashes any notion the president could pardon state crimes: “[H]e shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.”
The problem here is that some of Trump’s biggest true believers got jammed up in state court, and neither Trump nor Martin can stand the fact that Trump can’t reach down and