Former Trump officials profit as pardon lobbying surges under Trump

Mo Strategies has moved into pardon lobbying, landing Blessinger Legal in Northern Virginia for “immigration and pardon-related discussions” and has taken in $500,000 from the engagement. The firm was founded by Marty Obst and Robert Goad, two Trump-world figures.

Obst expects more pardon-related work and calls Mo Strategies one of the fastest-growing lobbying firms in the capital. Goad served as a special assistant to the president on domestic policy in the first Trump White House and worked on Trump’s 2016 campaign. In a White House statement, Trump called it “detestable” that anyone would try to profit off pardons, and the Justice Department’s pardon office has received a record number of clemency applications and follows a longstanding process designed to be consistent, unbiased and lawful.

Federal lobbyists disclosed more than $2.1 million in 2025 from people seeking pardons or clemency from Trump, with at least $815,000 of that spent in the fourth quarter alone. OpenSecrets counted $2,215,000 in lobbying revenue for Mo Strategies so far in 2025, hired two lobbyists and spent $985,000 on lobbying.

Joseph Schwartz was sentenced in April 2025 to three years in prison for his role in a $38 million tax-fraud scheme before Trump pardoned him in November. Schwartz paid lobbyists nearly $1.1 million in 2025 to pursue clemency. Joshua Nass registered to lobby for Schwartz the day before Trump signed the pardon on Nov. 14, 2025, and received $100,000 in the fourth quarter for “federal presidential pardon advocacy” and related relief efforts.

Nass was later charged in March 2026 in the Eastern District of New York with attempted Hobbs Act extortion after he recruited an individual to threaten a former client and the client’s son into paying him $500,000. Nass provided phone numbers and addresses, instructed the person to visit the son at home, paid $3,000 in cash and discussed physical assault. U.S. Attorney Joseph Nocella Jr. called Nass “plotted the violent extortion of one of his own clients,” and the FBI alleged he chose to “shake him down by hiring an enforcer to extort payment.” The Office of the Pardon Attorney, which has backed the presidential pardon power for more than 100 years, defines clemency as pardons, commutations, remission of fines or restitution, and reprieves.