What types of offenses were most commonly pardoned by Trump versus Obama and Biden?
Executive summary
Donald Trump’s clemency record in 2025 emphasized political allies, January 6 defendants and high‑profile white‑collar figures — including mass pardons for those tied to the Jan. 6 Capitol attack and numerous pardons of elected officials and business figures [1] [2] [3]. By contrast, Barack Obama and Joe Biden granted far more commutations (Obama 1,715 commutations; Biden granted the most commutations of any modern president) and their clemency portfolios included large numbers of commutations and targeted proclamations for categories such as certain marijuana convictions and veterans convicted under old military sodomy rules [4] [5] [2].
1. Trump’s pattern: loyalty, politics and high‑profile white‑collar cases
Trump’s 2025 clemency actions skew toward political allies, people involved in efforts to overturn the 2020 election, and well‑known fraud or corruption cases — a mix of mass Jan. 6 pardons and individual grants to politicians and business figures such as Rod Blagojevich, Trevor Milton and Devon Archer [3] [6] [2]. Reporting and government postings show an unprecedented mass pardon of roughly 1,500 individuals charged over Jan. 6 and later pardons for sitting or former elected officials and donors, suggesting clemency used as a political tool to protect allies and reciprocate loyalty [3] [7] [8].
2. White‑collar and fraud cases feature prominently in Trump’s docket
Multiple outlets and commentary note that aside from the Jan. 6 actions, a large share of Trump’s grants involved fraud, business‑fraud convictions and other white‑collar offenses — a pattern discussed on PBS and in Newsweek’s lists of recipients [9] [3] [6]. Analysts and civil‑justice advocates have criticized this emphasis, saying it normalizes public corruption and appears to prioritize political narratives of “unfair prosecutions” over systemic decarceration [9] [10].
3. Obama and Biden: volume, commutations and category‑based proclamation use
The Obama presidency issued a large number of clemency acts overall, but especially used commutations; Obama granted 1,715 commutations and received more than 36,000 petitions over two terms, reflecting a focus on sentence reductions within the Department of Justice process [4]. Biden, meanwhile, stands out for granting more commutations than any prior president and for using proclamations to pardon categories of offenses — notably certain federal marijuana convictions and veterans convicted under old military sexuality laws — demonstrating a category‑based, policy‑oriented use of clemency [4] [5].
4. Different uses of clemency: individual pardons vs. mass/commutation strategies
Trump’s most prominent clemency acts in 2025 were broad and politically charged (mass Jan. 6 pardons, high‑profile individual pardons), whereas Obama and Biden relied more on the traditional DOJ clemency pipeline and on commutations to reduce sentences at scale [4] [3]. Biden’s use of preemptive proclamations for categories (e.g., marijuana) contrasts with Trump’s individualized and politically symbolic grants [5] [2].
5. Legal and institutional questions shadowing Trump’s approach
Trump’s deployment of sweeping proclamations and delegation mechanisms has raised legal questions about how blanket language is interpreted and who determines coverage — with the Justice Department and courts drawn into deciding details of who benefits [11]. Critics argue that vague or broad pardons leave subordinate officials to make consequential decisions, and that such delegation can politicize the pardon process [11].
6. Outcomes and controversies: rearrests, optics and rule‑of‑law concerns
Observers point to cases where beneficiaries were later arrested again and to academic warnings that pardoning allies undermines perceived rule‑of‑law norms [10]. Supporters of Trump’s approach frame many grants as correcting prosecutorial overreach; opponents say the pattern favors the politically connected and normalizes corruption [10] [9].
Limitations and what reporting does not settle
Available sources do not provide a single, fully categorized dataset comparing the precise offense‑type breakdowns across all three presidents by percentage; instead, the public reporting emphasizes notable patterns (mass Jan. 6 pardons and white‑collar focus for Trump; high volume of commutations and category proclamations for Obama and Biden) and offers lists of individual grants to illustrate trends [3] [4] [5]. For a quantified, offense‑by‑offense comparison you would need DOJ pardon‑office tables or a comprehensive dataset aggregating every clemency grant by charge and year, which current reporting excerpts do not publish (not found in current reporting).