How do Trump's commutation and pardon rates compare to Barack Obama, George W. Bush, and Bill Clinton?
Executive summary
Donald J. Trump’s use of clemency is historically unusual: by some counts he has issued thousands of pardons and commutations in his second presidency (including mass proclamations for Jan. 6 defendants), making his total far higher than recent predecessors, while his first-term totals were among the lowest since 1900 (only George W. Bush and George H.W. Bush granted fewer) [1] [2] [3]. Barack Obama issued an exceptionally large number of commutations (especially for drug offenders) and is near the top among modern presidents for total clemency acts; Bill Clinton and George W. Bush both granted far fewer clemencies than Obama, with Bush among the least active multi-term presidents [1] [3] [4].
1. Trump’s clemency: a tale of two presidencies
Donald Trump’s first-term record on clemency was minimal compared with many presidents: Pew’s review of Justice Department data found only two presidents since 1900—George W. Bush and George H.W. Bush—granted fewer acts of clemency than Trump’s initial term [1]. That changed dramatically after his return to the White House, when official Justice Department pages and news reporting document mass pardons and a very large number of grants in 2025—proclamations pardoning roughly 1,500 Jan. 6 defendants and other high-volume actions—pushing his overall tally well above most recent presidents [2] [5] [6]. Official DOJ clemency pages list Trump among presidents with discrete grant lists for both terms, underscoring the unusual swing between sparse earlier use and prolific later use [4] [2].
2. Obama: commutations at scale, pardons more modest
Barack Obama used commutations far more than immediate predecessors, especially for people convicted of nonviolent drug offenses; that led to an unusually high number of commutations and drew partisan criticism at the time [1]. Multiple sources and the DOJ clemency archives show Obama’s clemency program produced thousands of acts (commutations in particular), making his overall clemency numbers among the largest of recent presidents even if his raw number of traditional pardons was not the very highest [1] [4].
3. Bill Clinton and George W. Bush: middling to low activity
Bill Clinton’s clemency record sits between extremes: he issued a substantial number of clemencies across his two terms but drew heavy attention and bipartisan criticism for controversial late-term pardons—most famously Marc Rich—which have become a perennial reference point for debates about favoritism in pardoning [1] [7]. George W. Bush was among the least active multi-term presidents on clemency: reporting cites Bush’s total pardons as unusually low for a two-term president, with one factbox noting Bush issued roughly 200 pardons—the lowest among multi-term presidents in recent modern comparisons [3] [4].
4. How “acts of clemency” are counted—and why comparisons are tricky
The Justice Department distinguishes categories—pardons, commutations, remissions and other actions—and its public statistics and recipient lists omit some mass or proclamation-based grants that weren’t processed through the Office of the Pardon Attorney [4]. Analysts therefore use different tallies: some counts emphasize pardons alone, others combine pardons and commutations as “acts of clemency.” Pew’s analysis of DOJ data calls out those differences and reports Trump’s first-term totals as low relative to modern presidents, while other outlets and later DOJ releases document massive 2025 proclamations that dramatically alter his cumulative standing [1] [2].
5. Political patterns and the controversies behind the numbers
The raw totals do not capture political intent. Obama’s commutation push was framed as criminal-justice reform; critics said it overstepped legislative prerogative [1]. Clinton’s late pardons were criticized as favoritism [1]. Trump’s later clemency actions have been described in multiple outlets as heavily partisan and protective of political allies and donors, including mass pardons for Jan. 6 defendants and clemency for campaign allies, prompting concerns about rule-of-law implications [5] [8] [6]. Reporting also highlights cases where recipients reoffended after being pardoned, used by critics as evidence of harm from expansive pardoning [7].
6. What the available sources don’t settle
Available sources document the relative ranks and notable episodes (mass Jan. 6 pardons, Obama’s commutations, Clinton’s Marc Rich pardon, Bush’s low totals), but they do not present a single, reconciled table in this packet that lists final cumulative pardons and commutations for each president through 2025 in one place; readers should note different outlets may count categories differently [4] [1] [2]. If you want a precise side-by-side numeric table for pardons versus commutations by president through a specific cutoff date, available sources do not mention a single standardized comparison in this set and further DOJ extraction would be required [4].
Sources cited: Department of Justice clemency pages and contemporary reporting summarized above [4] [1] [2] [5] [7] [8] [6] [3].