Trump’s clemency spree outpaces Mount Rushmore presidents combined

The four presidents carved into Mount Rushmore issued more than 1,100 pardons combined, but Donald J. Trump has already surpassed that mark and is still adding to it as he visits South Dakota tonight. A White House proclamation posted July 3, tied to the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, placed the show of power squarely in the Independence Day spotlight.

Trump’s current-term clemency record began with a sweeping Jan. 20, 2025 proclamation granting pardons and commutations for offenses related to the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the United States Capitol. The Justice Department’s Office of the Pardon Attorney publicly lists those 2025-present grants, putting the scale of Trump’s use of mercy on the record in real time.

The Constitution gives the president the sole power to grant pardons for offenses against the United States, and the National Archives says the Office of the Pardon Attorney has helped administer that process since 1894. The Archives also says pardon case files can include applications, recommendation letters, court and law-enforcement reports, and the final warrant receipt, a paper trail that once defined a slow, formal process now playing out under a far more visible political glare.

That glare sharpened this week as Trump privately weighed clemency for Sean “Diddy” Combs. People familiar with the discussions said Trump had not committed to a final number of people who might receive clemency, and a pardons meeting was scheduled for Friday afternoon, underscoring how the power is being handled not only as law, but as an instrument of reach and attention.

Trump’s first-term clemency list shows the same pattern. The Justice Department’s records include Joseph M. Arpaio, Kristian Saucier, Scooter Libby, Jack Johnson, Dinesh D’Souza, and Dwight and Steven Hammond, a roster that mixed political allies, public figures and cases that drew national notice.

The historical comparison is not exact. Justice Department statistics caution that pardon totals across administrations are not always apples-to-apples because mass grants and individual warrants are counted differently, and some older categories do not line up neatly. Even so, the contrast is stark enough to define Trump’s approach: while the Mount Rushmore presidents used clemency sparingly across generations, Trump is turning it into a visible extension of presidential power.