The Executive Pardon: A Transactional Tradition
Mainstream outlets routinely frame former President Donald Trump's approach to clemency as a radical departure, a 'reimagining' where pardons were transactional and influenced by political allegiance or personal connections. This narrative suggests an ethical breach, focusing on the optics of executive favors distributed to allies and donors, such as the reported considerations for convicted
January 6 participants. Yet, this convenient amnesia ignores a persistent pattern in American history. As early as 1862, Abraham Lincoln used pardons to reunite a fractured nation, often based on political utility rather than pure justice. Decades later, President George H.W. Bush controversially pardoned six Reagan administration officials implicated in the Iran-Contra affair in 1992, effectively
halting further investigation. In each instance, the executive act served a clear political interest, from maintaining power structures to protecting loyalists. What the public hears then is a selective outrage: a transactional pardon when a president from one party does it, versus a necessary act of statecraft when another does the same. Both are executive actions that benefit specific
individuals and, by extension, the political power of the grantor. The difference is largely in how the media describes them, often reflecting contemporary partisan battles more than consistent ethical standards, overlooking the reality that power brokers have always sought to protect their own. This pattern of executive clemency as political currency is not an innovation by any single individual