Trump issues 26 more pardons, including Paul Manafort, Roger Stone and Charles Kushner

WASHINGTON —  President Donald Trump issued 26 pardons on Wednesday night, including ones to his son-in-law Jared Kushner's father, and to his 2016 campaign manager Paul Manafort and Republican political operative Roger Stone.

The latest grants of executive clemency by Trump came a day after the president issued a first wave of 15 pardons, a week after the Electoral College confirmed he had lost the presidential election to Joe Biden.

"This is rotten to the core," Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Nebraska, said of the pardons.

Sasse's office, in issuing his statement, said Trump had exercised "his constitutional power to issue pardons to another tranche of felons like Manafort and Stone who flagrantly and repeatedly violated the law and harmed Americans."

Manafort, 70, was among the first in Trump's inner circle to face charges that were brought on by Special Counsel Robert Mueller's probe into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

Manafort, who was convicted of crimes related to his consulting work in Ukraine, thanked Trump on Twitter for sparing him from serving the bulk of his 7 and a 1/2-year prison sentence.

"Words cannot fully convey how grateful we are," the long-time Republican operative wrote.

Manafort was released earlier this year from prison due to concerns over the coronavirus.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-South Carolina, a close Trump ally, had said in March 2019 that "pardoning Manafort would be seen as a political disaster for the President."

"There may come a day down the road after the politics have changed that you would want to consider an  application from him like everybody else, but now would be a disaster," Graham said at the time.

The Manhattan District Attorney's office is still seeking to prosecute Manafort for New York state crimes.

A judge had barred DA Cyrus Vance Jr. from pursuing that case to trial because of a claim that it would violate double jeopardy rules barring being prosecuted twice for the same conduct.

Vance is appealing that decision.

His spokesman Danny Frost on Wednesday night said of Trump's pardon, "This action underscores the urgent need to hold Mr. Manafort accountable for his crimes against the People of New York as alleged in our indictment, and we will continue to pursue our appellate remedies."

Stone was convicted in November 2019 for lying under oath to Congress about his efforts to learn in advance about WikiLeaks disclosure of emails hacked from then-presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's campaign manager and the Democratic National Committee during the 2016 campaign by Russians.

Earlier this year, Trump commuted Stone's three year and four-month-long sentence less than a week before the Republican operative was due to begin his prison term.

In July, the White House called Stone "a victim of the Russia hoax," and someone who "would be put at serious medical risk" from the coronavirus if he was imprisoned.

Roger Stone, former campaign adviser to U.S. President Donald Trump, arrives at the federal courthouse where he is set to be sentenced, in Washington, U.S., February 20, 2020.

Leah Millis | Reuters

The real estate mogul Charles Kushner, whose son Jared Kushner is a senior White House advisor, was sentenced to two years in prison after pleading guilty in 2004 to 18 counts of tax evasion, witness tampering and making unlawful campaign donations.

Kushner, among other things, had hired a prostitute to lure his own brother-in-law William Schulder into a sexual tryst, which was secretly videotaped, and then sent to the man's wife, the sister of Charles Kushner. The stunt was designed to intimidate Schulder from acting as a witness in an investigation of Kushner for making illegal campaign contributions.

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a key Trump ally who prosecuted Charles Kushner, last year said in an interview that Kushner had committed "one of the most loathsome, disgusting crimes that I prosecuted when was U.S. attorney."

Charles Kushner and Jared Kushner attend an event at Lord & Taylor on March 28, 2012 in New York City.

Patrick McMullan | Patrick McMullan | Getty Images

But in announcing Kushner's pardon, the White House said, "Since completing his sentence in 2006, Mr. Kushner has been devoted to important philanthropic organizations and causes, such as Saint Barnabas Medical Center and United Cerebral Palsy."

"This record of reform and charity overshadows Mr. Kushner's conviction and 2 year sentence for preparing false tax returns, witness retaliation, and making false statements to the FEC," the White House said.

Trump also pardoned Margaret Hunter, the estranged wife of former Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., who pled guilty to charges of misusing campaign funds for personal expenses.

Duncan Hunter, who was convicted in the same case of the same crimes, had been pardoned the night before by Trump in a first wave of pardons by the president, who refuses to concede he lost the presidential election to Joe Biden.

Trump also commuted all or part of the criminal sentences of three people.

Two of them were Mark Shapiro and Irving Stitsky, who were each serving sentences of 85 years in prison for their key roles in a real-estate-related Ponzi scheme that defrauded more than 250 people out of $23 million. The sentencing judge in Stitsky's case called him an "inveterate con man."

A statement issued by White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany announcing the commutations of the remaining prison time for Shapiro and Stitsky said that their sentences were more than 10 times the years in prison offered to Shapiro in a plea deal he rejected, and almost 10 times the plea offer made to Stitsky.

McEnany's statement downplayed the severity of their crimes, saying, "Messrs. Shapiro and Stitsky founded a real estate investing firm, but hid their prior felony convictions and used a straw CEO. Due to the 2008 financial crisis, the business lost millions for its investors."

Trump on Tuesday issued pardons to 15 people, including two men convicted as part of special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation, and four former Blackwater USA guards who were convicted in the killings of 14 unarmed Iraqi civilians in Baghdad in 2007.

Others who received pardons included ex-GOP Rep. Chris Collins of Buffalo, New York, who illegally tipped of his son to a failed drug trial in a pharmaceuticals company.

Another recipient of a pardon Tuesday, was South Florida health-care facility owner Philip Esformes, who was in the early years of a 20-year prison term for what prosecutors said was "the largest health care fraud ever charged by the Department of Justice."

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