President Donald Trump issued 11 pardons or commutations of sentence on Tuesday, choosing to expunge the lawbreaking records of billionaire financier Michael Milken, the one-time “junk bond king,” and billionaire real estate magnate Edward J. DeBartolo Jr., former owner of the San Francisco 49ers professional football team.
He also pardoned former New York Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik, convicted of tax fraud and perjury, and commuted the 14-year jail term of former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich, impeached and then convicted on multiple corruption counts, including attempting to sell the Senate seat of Barack Obama after Obama’s election to the presidency in 2008. Blagojevich, a Democratic congressman before his election as governor, was released from prison immediately on Trump’s orders, and declared himself a “Trumpocrat” in the 2020 election.
— source wsws.org | 20 Feb 2020