Trump's presidential pardons serve himself -- not justice

Ruth Marcus on May 31, 2018

The D'Souza pardon makes Trump's point even more explicitly. "He was treated very unfairly by our government," Trump tweeted of D'Souza. Unfairly?

This is a man who pleaded guilty to deliberately violating campaign contribution limits on behalf of a friend running for a New York Senate seat, using straw donors to give her money, which he then reimbursed. While he claimed to be the target of selective prosecution by a Democratic administration, the judge who oversaw his case dismissed that assertion as "nonsense."

But don't let facts intrude. "What my case shows in miniature is the way Obama and Hillary [Clinton] too have gangster-ized US politics," D'Souza said on Laura Ingraham's radio show Thursday. So much for remorse. But it's easy to see how nicely D'Souza's assertions of victimhood dovetail with Trump's they're-out-to-get-me strategy.

So, too, with the president's clemency-in-waiting for Stewart and Blagojevich. Stewart was convicted of obstructing justice and lying -- why take that crime so seriously? Blagojevich was convicted on corruption charges that Trump dismissed as "being stupid and saying things that ... many other politicians say." How convenient to use a Democratic politician to transform criminal bribery into mere "bravado."

And if Trump's freely flowing pardons have the salutary side effect of suggesting to those caught up in the Russia probe that they might ultimately benefit from presidential clemency, so much the better, from his vantage point. As with everything else in this administration, the act of pardoning is not about serving justice, it is about serving Trump.

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Ruth Marcus' email address is ruthmarcus@washpost.com.