The Trump administration’s new chief pardon attorney is considering a plan to grant clemency to dozens of so-called fake electors who aided Donald Trump in his scheme to overturn the 2020 election, according to a person with knowledge of the discussions.
Ed Martin—the failed US attorney nominee whom Trump recently named to a different high-level role in the Justice Department—is working on a plan to recommend federal pardons for all these reputed Trump electors, despite the fact that none have been charged with federal crimes. The move would be part of the larger campaign to remove the stain of Trump’s attempt to steal the 2020 election, an effort that has included the president’s mass pardons of January 6 rioters.
The person familiar with the plan said these possible pardons have not yet been approved by the White House. But they are part of a swirl of activity by Martin, a former far-right activist and “Stop the Steal” organizer.
Less than three weeks into his new job, Martin has already played a role in 17 pardons and eight commutations signed by Trump. Among the recipients was a convicted tax cheat whose mother is a major Trump fundraiser, who attended a $1 million dinner with the president a few weeks earlier. Martin, meanwhile, has sat for a slew of interviews, mostly with right-wing venues, in which he has outlined plans to investigate matters such as the conduct of January 6 prosecutions, allegations that then-President Joe Biden improperly issued pardons using an autopen, unspecified claims about Dr. Anthony Fauci, and the prosecution of militia members convicted of plotting in 2020 to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.
Martin’s new influence is a turnabout from a few weeks ago, when the death of his nomination as US attorney for the District of Columbia—a job Martin had been performing on an acting basis since Trump’s inauguration—marked an embarrassing defeat for the president. Martin’s reputation had been damaged by scrutiny of his ties to an alleged Nazi sympathizer and his apparently false statements downplaying that relationship. Republican senators also appeared concerned about his threats to use prosecutorial power to punish universities, environmental groups, medical journals, Democratic lawmakers, and Trump critics.
Martin now appears even better positioned to wield DOJ power to advance Trump’s agenda and exact political retribution. That’s because Trump, after withdrawing Martin’s US attorney nomination, named him associate deputy attorney general, pardon attorney, and head of the so-called weaponization working group set up at the DOJ to target what the president claims were politicized prosecutions and other abuses during the Biden administration. None of these roles require Senate confirmation.
The elector scheme was a key component of Trump’s plan to overturn the 2020 presidential race. Citing bogus election fraud claims, Trump wanted Mike Pence—who, as vice president, oversaw Congress’ electoral vote certification—to reject the legitimate results in favor of pro-Trump slates of electors from seven key battleground states. As part of this plot, Trump backers in five of those states falsely claimed to be the legitimate electors. This has led to state criminal charges against against more than 40 people, including fake electors and other people involved in the effort. Most of those those cases are still pending. (In two other states Biden won—Pennsylvania and New Mexico—Trump supporters signed documents saying they would be the legitimate electors only if the election results were overturned; none of those individuals were charged with crimes.)
Federal pardons for fake electors would have no official bearing on the state criminal cases. But Martin hopes the pardons would serve a “symbolic” value in declaring the electors blameless and maybe even help sway courts, the source familiar with the plan said. The pardons would be in sync with Trump’s denial of wrongdoing in the federal case in which he was charged with crimes related to the fake electors plot. The Justice Department ended that case against Trump after he was reelected president in November.
The elector clemency effort would be part of an broader initiative to present Trump with the option of issuing numerous symbolic pardons, many of them posthumous, the source said. For example, Martin might urge Trump to pardon John F. Kennedy supporters who in 1960 signed paperwork saying they were Hawaii’s electors when a recount left the actual winner of the state uncertain. Kennedy ultimately won Hawaii, and the electors were accepted as the state’s legitimate slate. The Kennedy electors, of course, were never charged with state or federal crimes. Pardoning them now would be meaningless, except as a gesture to boost the claim by Trump supporters that the fake electors of 2020 similarly did nothing wrong.
A Justice Department spokesperson declined to comment. The White House did not respond to a request for comment.
Martin’s plan for fake electors, even dead ones, to receive largely symbolic pardons is an example of the publicity-heavy approach he is taking as he melds his pardon and weaponization jobs into a combined role of all-out partisan advocacy.
“We’ll be a little bit more outward-facing in terms of talking about what’s happening,” Martin said at a May press conference outlining his plans. “The law can be taken up, but the starting point is to make sure that the public sees that we’re doing it.”
This sounds like a plan to publicly launch investigations that please the president, even if few people in the task force’s crosshairs ultimately face charges—presumably because few have committed actual crimes. Such efforts would violate a DOJ tradition, and written rules, that say the department should pursue justice by prosecuting crimes in court rather than through public relations offensives.
But Martin appears unconcerned. “If they can be charged, we’ll charge them,” he said at the press conference. “But if they can’t be charged, we will name them…and in a culture that respects shame, they should be people that are ashamed.”
To aid his probes, Martin is hoping to add to the weaponization team a handful of FBI whistleblowers who testified before Congress about what they said were problems with the bureau’s investigation of January 6 attackers. Martin seemingly alluded to this plan during a recent interview with conservative podcast host Breanna Morello, who specifically mentioned Steve Friend and Garret O’Boyle—FBI agents reprimanded after speaking out on the matter—as potential additions to the task force. “You’re gonna be happy, Breanna,” Martin responded. “And you’re gonna deserve a lot of credit…We gotta bring them in.”
Martin has said the weaponization group will investigate the DOJ’s use of a specific criminal statute against numerous January 6 rioters. The Supreme Court ultimately ruled that this provision, which can carry a sentence of up to 20 years in prison, did not apply to most of those defendants. Martin has previously called for jailing whoever “ordered” the use of this obstruction statute, 18 USC 1512. While leading the DC US attorney’s office, he opened an internal investigation into his subordinates’ use of the statute in the Capitol riot prosecutions. He told Tucker Carlson recently that the weaponization group will continue that effort, aiming to determine “who made the 1512 call.”
Martin is also reportedly personally reviewing a pardon request by Stewart Rhodes, founder of the Oath Keepers militia, who was convicted of seditious conspiracy in 2022. Rhodes is one of 14 members of the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys who received commutations, but not pardons, from Trump on January 20. Roughly 1,600 other January 6 convicts and defendants received full pardons at the time.
Martin has used his X feed to cheer on Trump’s pardons, and he has been notably vocal about his efforts to encourage Trump to use the pardon power to reward political allies. Last week, Trump pardoned Scott Jenkins, a Republican sheriff and Trump supporter from Virginia who was convicted in December of accepting bribes in exchange for giving law enforcement powers to a businessmen. Martin quickly made his own view clear. Although Jenkins’ prosecution had no obvious link to partisan politics, Martin celebrated it by posting: “No MAGA left behind.”
This post has been syndicated from Mother Jones, where it was published under this address.