President Donald Trump has signed an govt order pardoning Rod Blagojevich, the previous Illinois governor who was sentenced to 14 years in jail earlier than Trump commuted his sentence in 2020.
“It is my honor to do it,” Trump stated throughout remarks from the Oval Workplace on Monday. “He was arrange.”
Trump referred to as the Democratic former governor a “very high-quality particular person” and stated he did not know him apart from that he was on his TV present, “Celeb Apprentice.”
The previous few months, Blagojevich has been lively on X, expressing his assist for the president and reposting content material from Trump’s interior circle, together with Elon Musk and Kash Patel, Trump’s option to be director of the FBI.
“Trump freed me & Obama bought me out so I am biased, however I consider Trump has completed extra as President in his whirlwind first 8 days than Obama did in his whole 8 years. What do you assume?” Balgojevich wrote on X final month.
Former Illinois governor and convicted felon Rod Blagojevich speaks to the press outdoors of the Dirksen Federal Courthouse on Aug. 2, 2021 in Chicago.
Scott Olson/Getty Photographs, FILE
Blagojevich, a Democrat and self-proclaimed “Trump-o-crat,” responded to former President Joe Biden’s preemptive pardons in January, telling Piers Morgan Uncensored that he believed such actions have been the “mistaken issues to do.”
“I imply, President Biden weaponized the justice division in opposition to Donald Trump. So he simply assumed that Trump’s going to do the identical factor to his those that he did to Trump and to Trump’s individuals,” he stated, including that “there isn’t any proof that President Trump goes to do something.”
On his first day again in workplace, Trump introduced sweeping pardons and commutations for practically the entire rioters charged with the Jan. 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol.
“I pardon those that have been assaulted themselves. They have been assaulted by our authorities,” Trump stated on Sunday with reference to his Jan. 6 pardons.
In 2011, Blagojevich was convicted on 17 counts of corruption, together with an try to promote the U.S. Senate seat that former President Barack Obama vacated after being elected to the White Home in 2008.
Throughout his first time period, Trump referred to as Blagojevich’s 14-year sentence a “tremendously highly effective, ridiculous” sentence, although he had additionally expressed that he didn’t know Blagojevich nicely.
President Donald Trump indicators a doc within the Oval Workplace of the White Home, Feb. 4, 2025, in Washington.
Evan Vucci/AP
The previous governor was anticipated to be launched in 2024, factoring in two years of credit score for good conduct. He started serving time in 2012, and Trump commuted his sentence in 2020.
Upon launch, Blagojevich expressed his “profound and eternal gratitude for President Trump,” calling this an “act of kindness” that represented the “starting of the method to really flip an injustice right into a justice.”
“He did not have to do that, he is a Republican president, I used to be a Democratic governor,” Blagojevich additionally stated on the time.
In 2009, Blagojevich made a star look on NBC’s “The Apprentice,” a actuality TV present hosted by Trump, the place he might be seen getting “fired.”
