Which U.S. presidents have faced criminal charges and in what years?
Executive summary
Two individuals who served as U.S. president have faced criminal-processing events in American history: Ulysses S. Grant was physically arrested for a local traffic violation in 1872, and Donald J. Trump was criminally charged beginning in 2023 and later tried and convicted in 2024 in at least one matter; several other presidents have been the subject of high‑profile investigations or near-indictments but, according to the reporting assembled here, were never formally charged while in or after office [1] [2] [3] [4] [5].
1. Ulysses S. Grant — a 19th‑century arrest over a “traffic” offense
The only sitting president documented as having been taken into police custody was Ulysses S. Grant, who in 1872 was arrested for speeding with his horse and buggy and subsequently released after paying a fine, a small‑scale incident that nevertheless registers in legal histories as the lone presidential arrest prior to the modern era [1] [2] [6].
2. Donald J. Trump — multiple criminal charges beginning in 2023 and the first presidential conviction in U.S. history
Donald J. Trump became the first former president to be criminally charged when a Manhattan grand jury returned an indictment in March 2023 related to alleged falsified business records concerning a hush‑money payment; he was arraigned and pleaded not guilty [1] [3]. That indictment was only the opening salvo in a slate of prosecutions and charges reported in 2023–2024: a separate federal indictment by Special Counsel Jack Smith in June 2023 alleged mishandling of classified documents, additional federal charges in August 2023 involved alleged efforts to obstruct the 2020 electoral count, and a Fulton County, Georgia indictment in August 2023 charged election‑related offenses tied to the 2020 result there [3]. Reporting and legal analysis note that the New York hush‑money trial produced a jury conviction on 34 felony counts for falsifying business records in May 2024 — a historic first conviction of a former U.S. president — while other criminal cases against him continued through 2024 and beyond [4] [5] [3].
3. Presidents investigated or impeached but not criminally charged
Several presidents have faced intense legal or congressional scrutiny without formal criminal charges. Richard Nixon confronted likely criminal exposure from Watergate investigations but was never indicted after he resigned; his successor Gerald Ford issued a pardon in 1974 aimed at closing criminal exposure and averting prosecution [6] [2]. Bill Clinton was the subject of a criminal investigation tied to testimony about his relationship with Monica Lewinsky and faced the risk of perjury and obstruction charges, but he ultimately was not criminally charged — though he was impeached by the House and acquitted by the Senate on related counts [6] [4] [2]. Reporting assembled here emphasizes that these high‑profile episodes produced serious legal jeopardy and political consequences but, per available sources, did not result in criminal indictments of presidents themselves [6] [2].
4. How historians and legal scholars frame “presidential criminality” and limits of the record
Legal scholarship and mainstream reporting caution that the Constitution and judicial precedent complicate questions about indicting a sitting or former president, and they stress distinguishing between presidential misconduct, criminal exposure of subordinates, and formal charges against the officeholder himself; sources underline that before the Trump prosecutions, no president had been both criminally charged and convicted, and that many prior scandals produced convictions only of aides or associates, not the president [2] [6] [7]. The assembled reporting further documents disagreements about when and whether to pursue charges against a president and the political calculation that has sometimes led successors (as with Ford) to act to foreclose prosecutions [6] [2].