Mark Osler
School of Law Professor Mark Osler in 2022 (Liam James Doyle / University of St. Thomas)

In the News: Mark Osler Discusses Presidential Pardons With The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post and Others

Mark Osler, professor at the University of St. Thomas School of Law, recently spoke with multiple national news outlets, including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post, for various stories about the changing world of presidential pardons.

New York Times

From The New York Times:

Many of those convicted of storming the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, have celebrated the pardons or commutations that they received this week from President Trump.

Not Pamela Hemphill. A retired drug and alcohol counselor who lives in Boise, Idaho, she pleaded guilty in January 2022 to a misdemeanor offense for entering the Capitol during the riot and was sentenced to 60 days in prison and three years of probation.

She said she did not want a pardon. ...

It is not clear that she can legally reject the pardon.

“It would be a novel act to file a court case to reject a pardon of a misdemeanor, in part because of the low stakes,” Mark Osler, a professor at the University of St. Thomas School of Law in Minneapolis, said in an interview.

There is some legal precedent, however, suggesting that any such request could face an uphill battle.

From The Wall Street Journal:

U.S. presidents have held the right to pardon crimes since the country’s founding, and they have exercised it often with political and personal considerations in mind. But legal scholars said the power’s bounds have never been so stretched as Monday, when incoming President Trump used it to relitigate the Jan. 6, 2021, riot and departing President Biden used it not for mercy but as a shield.

Trump’s final decision to issue blanket pardons and commutations to the more than 1,500 of his followers charged in connection with the Capitol attack came just days before the inauguration, people familiar with the matter said. While some people close to Trump discussed the merits of issuing pardons on a case-by-case basis depending on the severity of a defendant’s conduct, Trump ultimately favored quick action that could broadly apply to everyone, the people said.

Washington Post Logo

From The Washington Post:

Biden’s announcements Monday “are a valid exercise of pardon power. But that doesn’t answer whether they are a wise use of that power,” said Mark Osler, a law professor at the University of St. Thomas School of Law and an expert on clemency. “You can see the incoming administration will see this as an invitation to do the same.”

Trump did not need the invitation.

Later Monday, Trump issued a blanket pardon for virtually all of the Jan. 6 Capitol riot defendants and commuted the sentences of the remaining 14 – a broad move that gives some form of clemency to all those charged or convicted in the violent attack. Taken together, “they reflect a wholesale rethinking of what pardoning means,” said Osler.

“Clemency is the soul of the Constitution, and it’s been used to show our highest principles of national reconciliation and mercy,” said Osler. “To see it used for political purposes and as a chess game does sully that history.”