Several legal experts weighed in on whether former President Donald Trump could pardon himself after he was charged with multiple counts in Fulton County, Georgia, this week.
“If there were to be a sympathetic Republican elected president, Trump, on a federal conviction or the federal charges, could be given a pardon immediately,” Ronald Carlson, a professor at the University of Georgia School of Law, told news outlets. “That is not possible in Georgia.”
Mr. Carlson believes that the former president would have to serve at least five years in prison before he can be pardoned by the board. “Here’s the kicker: President Trump could only apply for a pardon if he were to be convicted only after he served five years in a Georgia penitentiary,” he said.
According to the U.S. Constitution’s Article II, a president has the “Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.” It doesn’t mention state charges.
“I could see a court delay a proceeding, perhaps even delaying the imposition of a sentence to avoid having a sitting president simultaneously involved in criminal litigation or serving a sentence,” Mr. Neily said Thursday. “I think that’s conceivable. But I just don’t really think it’s plausible that a court would find that the president of the United States has some unwritten power to pardon himself from state crimes and just make those prosecutions go away entirely.”
Meanwhile, in Georgia, the governor doesn’t have the power to grant pardons. A five-member state board of pardons and paroles, which is made up of officials appointed by the governor, is able to issue a pardon.
John Malcolm, vice president for the Institute for Constitutional Government at the Heritage Foundation, told Fox that the former president appears to have “plenary authority to pardon people for federal crimes, but not for state crimes.” If he is convicted in Georgia or New York but is ultimately elected president, it could pose a constitutional problem.
“A president has to be able to carry out the duties of being president of the United States, so I think if a president were convicted and incarcerated, I think that a very strong argument can be made that the state could not interfere with his ability to serve as president, and you can’t serve as president from a jail cell,” Mr. Malcolm said.
“Similarly, I think that if there were a state court indictment pending against the president, that indictment would have to be held in abeyance for the entire time that the president served in office, and then it could be taken up again if anyone was so inclined to do it after he or she leaves office.”
Mr. Neily added that he believes that the former president likely will not serve jail time as the judges in those cases will “try to figure out a way to impose some form of punishment that’s sort of sufficiently satisfying to the public or that portion of the public that thinks that the prosecutions were appropriate short of actually incarcerating him in an actual prison.”
He noted: “I’m just not sure that I can really see a former president going to jail with his Secret Service detail.”
President Trump, 77, this week was charged with 13 counts in connection to his efforts after the 2020 election, which included mandatory minimum sentences of five years in prison. Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis requested to try the one-time president starting March 4, although there will likely be motions to move the case to another court.
That would have the trial starting a day before Super Tuesday, when the most delegates are at stake in the primary contest to decide the next Republican presidential nominee. Roughly 14 primaries are set to be held across the country, from California and Texas to Massachusetts and Maine. President Trump is currently his party’s dominant frontrunner.
Ms. Willis is also proposing that arraignments for the defendants happen the week of Sept. 5. She had already set a deadline of noon Aug. 25 for all the defendants to turn themselves in at the Fulton County Jail to be booked. That would seem to suggest that the former president and the others could be making two trips to Georgia in the coming weeks, first to surrender and then later for an arraignment.
