How many people has trump pardoned in both terms

1. How reporters count pardons: named grants versus mass proclamations

News outlets and watchdogs distinguish between individually named pardons (where a document lists a person) and broad proclamations that purport to apply to categories of people; The Fulcrum summarized Trump’s output as “about 238 named individuals across both terms, plus mass pardons for thousands,” reflecting one tally that excludes some later named grants and uses a conservative aggregation method ^[1], while Ballotpedia counted 142 pardons in Trump’s second term alone as of Nov. 9, 2025, noting that figure does not include unnamed beneficiaries of mass pardons ^[2].

2. The arithmetic for named, individual pardons

Multiple reputable trackers put Trump’s first-term individual pardons at roughly 143 and his second-term named pardons in the 140s as well, producing a simple arithmetic total near 285 named pardons across both terms ^{[1] [2] [5]}. Sources differ slightly—some outlets list 144 or 144+ in the second term—so a defensible range for individually named pardons across both terms is approximately 280–290 people ^{[6] [5]}.

3. Mass pardons push totals into the thousands—but how many is unclear

Trump issued at least two mass clemency actions early in his second term: one on Jan. 20 covering many Jan. 6–related convictions and another on Nov. 7 covering a broad set of acts related to the 2020 election, each described as applying beyond the list of specific names included in their texts ^{[7] [4]}. Journalists and analysts report that the Jan. 6 mass action alone covered “more than 1,000” cases by some counts, and some critics cite a total “over 1,500” clemency actions when combining mass proclamations and named grants, but official rolls do not publish exhaustively who counts under those proclamations, which is why estimates vary ^{[8] [5] [1]}.

4. Why tallies diverge: definitions, timing, and disclosure

Discrepancies stem from definitional choices—whether to count only individually named pardons, whether to include commutations separately, and whether to treat a mass proclamation as granting clemency to an identifiable list of persons when it does not name them—plus rolling updates to DOJ postings and independent trackers adding or subtracting people as new documents are released or reinterpreted ^{[1] [9] [7]}. The Justice Department’s public clemency page lists proclamations and some named grants but has not resolved the question of how many unnamed individuals fall under mass pardons, which leaves reporting outlets to estimate ^{[7] [9]}.

5. What the numbers mean: concentration, politics and legal ambiguity

Beyond raw counts, multiple sources emphasize that Trump’s clemency program is notable less for sheer volume than for its political clustering—many pardons and mass actions benefited political allies, donors or Jan. 6 defendants—prompting criticism that the clemency power was used for patronage and to erase legal consequences for associates, an assessment advanced by outlets including Prison Policy and the New York Times ^{[3] [10]}. Legal scholars note that the practical effect of a mass, category-based proclamation is ambiguous until courts, prosecutors or the DOJ clarifies how broadly it applies, which feeds ongoing disputes about whether the proclamations truly “pardon” thousands or remain largely symbolic ^{[4] [11]}.

Conclusion: a concise numeric answer with caveats

Counting only individually named, documented presidential pardons yields roughly 280–290 people across Trump’s two terms (about 143 in the first term and roughly 142 in the second, per trackers) ^{[1] [2] [5]}. Including the mass proclamations that purport to cover many Jan. 6 and election-related actors raises the effective total into the thousands, but the precise headcount is indeterminate from public records because the proclamations do not name every beneficiary and official tallies remain inconsistent ^{[7] [8] [4]}.