It’s time to get rid of pardons.
this post was submitted on 24 Dec 2025
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I never really understood WHY the president got to pardon people if the idea behind america is that nobody is above justice there. I mean i know its a LIE, but like lie better.
There are good reasons, but those reasons only exist in some utopia once in a lifetime bullshit crap, like pardoning draft dodgers for Vietnam.
Apart from that it seems its always been used for absolute bullshit
I didn’t even know that Carter did that. Fucking good. Drafting people into such an overtly bullshit war was straight up evil.
There are good reasons
So says everyone, but WHAT ARE those reasons?
"miscarriages of justice"? but i agree that those should not be arbited by the executive
If the miscarriages of justice is proven aren't people automatically released. What does a pardon have tondo with anything here?
drug crimes, for example… if the US govt decided selling weed is all of a sudden no longer a crime, that doesn’t automatically release people from prison
or if someone did something technically illegal, but the circumstance around it made it clearly the moral choice (perhaps something like whistleblowers)
the world is messy and no law perfectly covers all bases… pardons are the same as prosecutorial or police discretion. in an ideal world, the harshness of the law should be tempered by morality of the individuals at many levels
of course that falls apart when the morality at every level is non existent, but that is legitimate purpose/reason. imo the discussion shouldn’t be about the overall legitimacy of the powers themselves, but in the trade-offs and lack of real protections from abuse, or who gets to have a say in those things
I still don't see a good reason you couldn't go through a bill, running in front of congress, for this, as well as the Vietnam draft dodgers mentioned above.
I still don't see a good reason you couldn't go through a bill, running in front of congress, for this, as well as the Vietnam draft dodgers mentioned above.
because entire laws aren’t meant to handle individual cases. making laws is slow and laborious, and is meant to cover the broad strokes
the real fix is to have a panel or something, similar to how you have judges etc now, and i’m sure there are other solutions
the fact that the currently implementation is rife with abuse - and only pretty recently at that - isn’t a reason the whole thing shouldn’t exist (which is what the thread was about)
appeals are often either not available or not fair
The purpose is, ostensibly, to prevent some form of miscarriage of justice or an over harsh sentencing. Think the guy who they tried to charge with a felony for harmlessly throwing a sandwich at a federal officer, if they had managed to convict instead of failing to even get an indictment. Or it could also be used to retroactively forgive people convicted of breaking a law that has since been overturned. Like if they decriminalize weed possession, those already convicted while the law was in place don't automatically get their sentences overturned.
But it is a power that should be rarely needed, judiciously applied, and have sensible guardrails on it. But the founders were confident that the people wouldnt elect self centered autocrats, that congress and the courts wouldn't be filled with sycophants, opportunists, and cowards, and that the public wouldn't stand for blatant corrupt uses of presidential powers. But here we are.
Frankly, if we can't stop blatantly corrupt abuse of the pardon powers or even have basic limitations on it (like no self pardons) then that power should be amended out of the constitution.
Many of the founders of the USA were themselves self centred autocrats so I’m not entirely certain that the system isn’t working exactly as intended.
A law that releases prisoners of a certain crime can be made retroactive. What the law can't do is make something a crime retroactively.
Can be, but often isn't
Biden and Obama pardoned a bunch of people (thousands iirc) who were doing long federal sentences for weed possession.
But you know, it's theatre to justify having the pardon power. The heartwarming story at the end of the daily newsreel of corruption and conflict.
The better solution there is to fucking reschedule it. Treating the burns while the fire still rages is stupid.
Get rid of pardons, their abuse is more damaging than their utility.
I guess I understand what the purpose of being able to pardon people is. What I really meant was why is pardoning something unilaterally allowed to the president of the United States? That seems like giving a lot of “judge jury and executioner” power to one person based on a farce of democracy thats controlled by the elite of the US.
I realized I’ve answered my own question as i was typing it.
This president has taught us it’s time to get rid of a lot of things.
We knew that in 2020. I'll never forgive Biden for his inaction on reducing executive power.
Jackson called it. Unchecked power and running criminals enterprise out of WH.
GOP is a joke.
The GOP is doing what it was ultimately designed to do. They always wanted to be full mask off as it's less effort than having to pretend. Trump allows them to be who they always wanted to be.
Help me understand why presidential pardons exist?
More or less the same reason jury nullification exists, just concentrated on executive leadership. The problem isn't that it exists, the problem is the bribery and ethical issues. Theoretically, if the executive is abusing the power, the legislature is supposed to remove them, but since we no longer operate in a system where that will happen... Here we are.
because the world can’t be sorted into neat little boxes, and the law isn’t perfect. there are many things that are technically crimes that would be a moral imperative to ignore (eg whistleblowing, draft dodging for the vietnam war)
the law should be tempered. the system the US provides for that is police discretion, prosecutorial discretion, and pardon
perhaps the system should be different, but a mechanism to pardon people for crimes where society has moved on (selling weed, for example), or where a moral imperative to break the law exists (again, something like whistleblowers: chelsea manning was pardoned… or rather her sentence was commuted, which i believe is different but similar logical reasoning) is very important imo
you can’t simultaneously and logically hold these 2 things:
- lawmakers are idiots and the laws they make are broken and often moral
- the law is perfect and this should be applied without exception
The pardon of Changpeng Zhao, founder of cryptocurrency exchange Binance, drew scrutiny after lobbyists were paid approximately $800,000 before the pardon was granted.
According to Forbes, Zhao is the richest Canadian and the 21st-richest person in the world, with a net worth estimated at $88.0 billion as of October 2025
Literally peanuts. Paying bribes this cheap it's a no brainer. Compared to the median American net worth it's like paying $2.
I'm sure the paper trail showing what the lobbyists were paid is the mere tip of the iceberg.
There's no way in hell the founder of a cryptocurrency exchange didn't give Trump a massive payday of crypto off the books to secure his pardon.
Well, by pure coincidence, a stablecoin that wlfi is printing (Trump) was placed on binance just days after the pardon. But this is surely a coincidence
Presidential pardon is a direct son of king's pardon. And it's the same shit that should be eradicated.
Naw, Presidential Pardons should always be an option, cause a president should always be able to release prisoners jailed by their predecessor.
Whoever comes after trump needs a way to release the people trump went after for political reasons.
The way is to repeat the process in a faster way. If the judge finds there's no base for the case the person is released that same day. And if that person went to jail for something that is not illegal then the "new" process would last 15 minutes.
Sounds more like a Christmas special for oligarchs ... that's a pretty cheap price for a billionaire.
Hey look, the shithole banana republic is doing shithole banana republic things again!
If there isn’t some law created to stop these quid pro quo pardons then the presidential pardons should be removed.
Sounds like bribery to me. Which has a law and a cause for impeachment in the Constitution.
Unless it wasn't a bribe but just a gratuity. Thanks Roberts court!
The Constitution? You mean Trump's TP?
Welcome to the new reality, Fascist America.
The Taco Crime Family.
When you put a criminal in office, you can expect him to pardon other criminals. It's not rocket science. "Hey guys! I can control who can go free! Where are my close buddies? Ah yes, pardon. Oh you want that too? I love money, just so you know."
That seems surprisingly cheap?