Headline Roundup • May 29th, 2025
Trump Pardons Allies, TV Stars, Commutes Former Gang Leader
Summary from the AllSides News Team
President Donald Trump has issued a wave of pardons and commutations, erasing the convictions or reducing sentences for over two dozen individuals, including political allies, a renowned rapper, and the co-founder of a Chicago gang serving multiple life sentences for violent crimes.
The Details: Some notable pardons include Michael G. Grimm, a former New York representative who pleaded guilty to felony tax evasion in 2014; reality TV stars Julie and Todd Chrisley, convicted for evading taxes and defrauding banks; and rapper Kentrell Gaulden, also known as YoungBoy Never Broke Again, who had pleaded guilty to possessing weapons as a felon. Trump also commuted the sentence of Larry Hoover, former leader of the Gangster Disciples, a highly organized Chicago gang. He also pardoned John Rowland, the former Connecticut governor convicted of election fraud; army officer Mark Bashaw, who was convicted of violating Covid protection rules; and Tanner Mansell and John Moore, who were convicted of theft at sea after releasing sharks they thought were being illegally fished. However, the sharks were legally caught for research. Trump has also said he's considering pardoning the men charged with plotting to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer in 2020.
How The Media Covered It: A Washington Post (Lean Left bias) opinion piece said Trump pardoned “violent rioters and extremists.” NBC News (Lean Left) honed in on former Virginia sheriff Scott Jenkins' corruption case, arguing it symbolized the Justice Department's pullback from public corruption cases. Outlets on the right rarely featured commentary on the pardons. One of the few opinions on the right, from The Dispatch (Lean Right), said, “No MAGA left behind: That’s all there is to it. Outspoken Trump supporters who were successfully prosecuted by the prior administration are now being sprung from prison entirely irrespective of their guilt or remorse.”
Revised by the AllSides staff (of humans) after a first draft from our custom AI. Learn more. Support our mission. Suggest an improvement to this summary.
Featured Coverage of this Story
As part of a spree of clemency actions, US President Donald Trump on Wednesday commuted the federal prison sentence of Larry Hoover, the founder of a notorious Chicago street gang.
Hoover was the leader of the Gangster Disciples and in the 1990s was given six life sentences on conspiracy, extortion, drug and other criminal charges.
In addition to his federal sentence, Hoover still faces a 200-year jail term in the state of Illinois for murder, and is unlikely to be released soon. A president is unable to commute state-level sentences.
...
Illustration by Noah Hickey/The Dispatch (via Getty Images)
The Trump administration likes to justify illiberal policies with liberal arguments. It does this, I assume, because it’s easier to build public support for an un-American program if it’s presented as a vindication of traditional American values. But part of me wonders if it simply tickles the president and his lackeys to use the enemy’s language when attacking the enemy’s system.
One example is the culture war being waged by the White House in the name of fighting antisemitism. Donald Trump and his circle are quite tolerant of people with hostility...
The government's evidence against Scott Jenkins was compelling, including undercover video and other corroboration showing Jenkins, then the sheriff of Culpeper County, Virginia, accepting over $75,000 in exchange for giving law enforcement authority to local businessmen, as well as two undercover FBI special agents.
Jenkins’ co-defendants all pleaded guilty, and jurors didn't take long to convict Jenkins last year, deliberating for around two hours before they found him guilty on all counts. When Jenkins was sentenced to 10 years in prison in March, the acting U.S. attorney for the Western District of...
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