Trump gives more pardons in 1 day than most presidents in their full term. See rankings
President Donald Trump’s sweeping pardon for the approximately 1,500 people convicted of participating in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection on the Capitol was signed just hours after his return to office.
The Day One move puts Trump toward the top of the list for most pardons issued in a president’s entire term, data from the Department of Justice show.
The act of clemency puts Trump behind Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry Truman in the ranking for most pardons issued during a modern president’s term, with a couple of notable exceptions.
The total number of people forgiven under Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter’s pardons issued to people accused of evading the draft or deserting the military during the Vietnam War cannot be totally quantified, so those numbers are not included in the pardon attorney’s data, the Justice Department said.
Hundreds of thousands of Americans avoided or were forgiven of criminal charges as a result of the two presidents’ actions, according to the History Channel.
Trump’s move to pardon insurrectionists drastically outnumbers the 144 pardons issued during his first term in office, the data show.
In total, the president has granted approximately 1,644 pardons, trailing F.D.R. by 1,175 pardons, which were issued during his 12-year term.
The last president to issue over 1,000 pardons was Dwight D. Eisenhower, which he issued throughout the course of his 8-year term between 1953-1961.
Just weeks before Trump’s sweeping act, former President Joe Biden made one of the “largest act of clemency in a single day in modern presidential history,” NPR reported, yet he ranks at the bottom of the pardons list.
That’s because the record-breaking act of clemency issued by the former president mainly commuted sentences, rather than completely pardoning the offense.
Pardon vs. commutation of sentence
Executive clemency is granted to presidents in Article II of the Constitution. With this power, presidents can pardon, which completely forgives a crime, or commute a sentence, which can partially or totally remove a person’s criminal sentence, according to the Office of the Pardon Attorney.
Before leaving office, Biden commuted the sentences of nearly 1,500 people, including commuting the death sentences of 37 federal death row inmates. The 37 formerly on death row will now serve a life sentence without the possibility of parole.
This action is different from the pardon Biden issued to his son, Hunter Biden, who was freed from his conviction of federal gun and tax charges.
A commutation of sentence, according to the pardon attorney’s office, “does not change the fact of conviction, imply innocence, or remove civil disabilities that apply to the convicted person as a result of the criminal conviction.”
This story was originally published January 23, 2025 at 6:15 PM with the headline "Trump gives more pardons in 1 day than most presidents in their full term. See rankings."
