How many clemency grants (pardons and commutations) did each president from Clinton to Biden issue annually?
Executive summary
Available official and research sources show wide variation in how many clemency acts (pardons and commutations) presidents issued from Bill Clinton through Joe Biden; Clinton issued a total of 459 clemencies in his presidency (per the Clinton archives) and Pew/DOJ tallies show Obama granted 1,927 acts, Trump (first term) 237, and Biden’s 2021–2025 total dwarfs prior modern presidencies with thousands of commutations and pardons concentrated at term end (Clinton 459; Obama 1,927; Trump 237; Biden multiple thousands) [1] [2] [2] [3]. Exact annual breakdowns are not consistently published by year in the cited material; Justice Department “clemency statistics” and Pew analyses report totals by administration and note most grants cluster late in terms [4] [3].
1. The baseline numbers reporters use — administration totals, not neat yearly tables
The commonly cited figures come from administration totals compiled by the Department of Justice and analyzed by centers like Pew: Clinton — 459 clemency actions in his eight years, Obama — 1,927 acts (1,715 commutations and 212 pardons), Trump (first term) — 237 acts (143 pardons, 94 commutations), and Biden — a record-setting total running into the thousands largely concentrated at the end of his term (Clinton 459; Obama 1,927; Trump 237; Biden thousands) [1] [5] [2] [3]. These are administration aggregates; annual, per-calendar-year counts require parsing DOJ warrant lists or White House releases by date [4] [6].
2. Why annual breakdowns are hard to produce from public sources
The Office of the Pardon Attorney maintains clemency warrant counts and notes caveats about fiscal-year definitions, class proclamations excluded from its charts, and post‑hoc corrections to records, meaning simple per-year tallies in public datasets can be inconsistent or incomplete [4]. Pew’s analysis compares presidents using DOJ data but reports totals by presidency and flags that many actions occur in a president’s final months — a pattern that complicates fair “per-year” comparisons [3] [7].
3. Timing matters: end‑of‑term flurries dominate the statistics
Multiple sources emphasize that presidents concentrate clemency acts late in their administrations. Clinton issued 177 acts in his final hours on Jan. 20, 2001; Obama issued hundreds on Jan. 19, 2017; Trump issued dozens in his final pre‑departure days; and Biden’s largest single-day commutations and pardons were announced in January 2025, including a commutation list of 2,490 individuals on Jan. 17, 2025 [7] [2] [6]. Pew’s reporting notes that more than 80% of Biden’s total acts came in his final weeks, underscoring the clustering effect that skews year-to-year comparisons [3].
4. Examples that illustrate the scale — Biden’s mass commutations and DOJ pages
The White House posted a list announcing the commutation of 2,490 individuals on Jan. 17, 2025 and separate statements show additional commutations and pardons across January 2025, while DOJ pages and Pew coverage document Biden’s totals surpassing prior presidents [6] [8] [3]. DOJ clemency pages also reflect new administrations’ post‑inauguration proclamations (for example, Trump’s 2025 proclamations pardoning Jan. 6 defendants) and the Office of the Pardon Attorney provides searchable recipient lists though not a tidy per‑calendar‑year table [9] [4].
5. What the sources don’t provide — and what that means for answering “annual” counts
Available sources do not publish a consistently verified, year-by-year table for each president from Clinton through Biden that distinguishes pardons vs. commutations per calendar year; instead they provide administration totals, DOJ warrant lists, White House release dates, and research analyses that aggregate by presidency [4] [3]. To produce annual counts with forensic accuracy would require extracting dates from DOJ clemency warrants and White House proclamations and reconciling exclusions (class proclamations, fiscal-year conventions) noted by the Office of the Pardon Attorney [4].
6. Two ways to get the annual breakdown you asked for
Option A — I can parse DOJ warrant lists and White House clemency release pages cited above and produce a year‑by‑year table (pardons vs. commutations) for each presidency, noting excluded class proclamations and DOJ caveats (this is data work that will reproduce source citations for each entry) [4] [6]. Option B — accept administration‑level numbers (Clinton 459; Obama 1,927; Trump 237 in first term; Biden thousands including a Jan. 17, 2025 commutation of 2,490) as the best-available, easily cited summary from public sources [1] [5] [2] [6].
Limitations: reporting inconsistencies originate with DOJ’s treatment of class proclamations and fiscal‑year definitions; multiple sources emphasize final‑term concentrations that distort simple per‑year comparisons [4] [7]. Tell me which option you prefer and I will produce the year-by-year breakdown with line‑by‑line citations drawn only from the sources above.