01 June 2018 - Trump Pardons Conservative Pundit Dinesh D'Souza
Dinesh D’Souza Pardoned By Trump For Campaign Finance Violation
Marina Fang (The Huffington Post, 31/05/2018)
President Donald Trump on Thursday issued “a full pardon” to Dinesh D’Souza, a conservative activist and provocateur who regularly peddles conspiracy theories.
D’Souza pleaded guilty in 2014 to violating campaign finance laws with an illegal donation to a GOP Senate candidate.
Trump announced the pardon in a tweet, claiming D’Souza “was treated very unfairly by our government!”
Trump pardons Dinesh D'Souza -- and hints at more celebrity pardons
Kaitlan Collins, Maegan Vazquez and Laura Jarrett (CNN, 31/05/2018)
President Donald Trump announced unexpectedly Thursday that he is granting a full pardon to Dinesh D'Souza, the conservative author and filmmaker who pleaded guilty to violating federal campaign finance laws in 2014 after he was indicted earlier that year on charges that he illegally used straw donors to contribute to Republican Senate candidate Wendy Long in New York in 2012.
"Will be giving a Full Pardon to Dinesh D'Souza today. He was treated very unfairly by our government!" Trump tweeted.
Trump’s pardons show his twisted brand of mercy
Ruth Marcus (The Washington Post, 31/05/2018)
If, as is often said, a president’s budget proposal presents a glimpse of his heart, a president’s use of his pardon power offers a companion, and even more telling, X-ray of his soul.
Writing a budget involves making trade-offs and priorities, but these must be examined and ratified by others, elsewhere. The power to pardon is more uniquely personal, both in that pardons tend to be granted to individuals, based on the circumstances of their particular cases, and in that it is an authority that resides solely within the purview of the president.
What, then, does President Trump’s suite of pardons — five over the course of his still-young presidency — tell us? Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama each took about two years to dispense their first pardons. Trump, by contrast, has embraced his role as what Alexander Hamilton described as the “dispenser of the mercy of government.”
A Look at Dinesh D’Souza, Pardoned by Trump
Daniel Victor (The New York Times, 31/05/2018)
Dinesh D’Souza, the best-selling author and documentarian who received a presidential pardon for a felony conviction of making illegal campaign contributions, has spent almost four decades in a cycle of provocation and controversy that has made him, at times, a hero of the right.
His books and movies attacking liberal ideologies and politicians have had great commercial success, but he has promoted conspiracy theories and his work has been criticized as inaccurate and excessively incendiary, sometimes by other conservatives.
President Trump pardoned him on Thursday, saying that Mr. D’Souza had been “treated very unfairly by our government,” echoing a claim the commentator has often made himself.