OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
The executive editor of the National Review penned a column last week, a day after now-President-elect Donald Trump’s resounding victory, calling on President Joe Biden to invite him to the White House and prepare a pardon for his successor.
While Biden did invite Trump, who arrived at the White House Wednesday morning, it’s not clear whether a pardon is forthcoming.
“Biden should … move to use his constitutional authority to pardon Donald Trump of all pending federal charges, and relieve special counsel Jack Smith of his duties,” Mark Antonio Wright noted. “He should then ask New York governor Kathy Hochul to use her authority to pardon Trump for the crimes he was convicted of in New York State.”
While going on to claim that Trump is at least partially responsible for the crimes he’s been either charged with or convicted of, Wright noted that Trump’s Electoral College and national majority victories are “a definitive verdict on the subject delivered by the highest authority: the people.”
“Wise or not, a majority of the public chose to reelect Donald Trump as the next president of the United States. He deserves to enter that term in January 2025 with the slate wiped clean of the controversies of the previous era,” Wright noted.
“No good at all will come of an American president fulfilling his constitutional duties at home and abroad under the cloud of pending criminal prosecutions. No good whatsoever will come of Trump himself ordering the Justice Department to drop the charges or by crossing the Rubicon in American life of ‘self-pardoning,'” he added.
“Joe Biden has not often spent his time in office acting much like a statesman. But a pardon now of Donald Trump would be statesmanlike. And such an act would go a long way toward ending the cycle of lawfare that, if left unchecked, will cause more harm and more damage to the body politic. Gerald Ford’s pardon of Richard Nixon is the precedent here, and it’s a good one,” Wright said.
“Donald Trump should accept such a pardon, if offered by Joe Biden. Trump should then find a way to, at least rhetorically, extend an olive branch to the outgoing president,” he added.
Special Counsel Jack Smith is likely to step down from his position after ending his cases against President-elect Donald Trump, according to Wednesday reports.
A Justice Department source told CNN that Smith is in talks with DOJ leaders about how best to wind down the Jan. 6 case as well as an appeal of U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon’s ruling over the summer to throw out his classified documents case against the soon-to-be 47th president.
“Trump has threatened to fire Smith, but Smith expects to be gone before Trump takes office,” CNN reported.
“The talks between Smith and DOJ leaders extend beyond Trump’s criminal cases to questions about what to do with other defendants in the classified documents case as well as the special counsel’s office and what happens to its budget and staff,” the outlet continued.
Smith is required to submit a report on his work to Attorney General Merrick Garland. It remains unclear whether the timing of Smith’s departure will be affected if the report needs to be reviewed and approved by the intelligence community, according to sources familiar with the discussions, CNN said.
Smith is working to finalize the report before Trump takes office, as Garland will need to approve it and decide whether any part of it will be released publicly, one source said. The New York Times was the first to report Smith’s plans to resign from his post.
Before his departure, Smith will need to determine how to resolve the two criminal cases he initiated against Trump.
In Florida, Smith has appealed Cannon’s decision to dismiss the classified documents case, which found that Smith was unconstitutionally appointed as special counsel and that the funding for his office also violated the law.
In Washington, D.C., Smith’s team is moving forward with the criminal case accusing Trump of orchestrating a conspiracy to overturn the 2020 election following the Supreme Court’s ruling on presidential immunity, CNN noted.
