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Former acting FBI chief Andrew McCabe has criticized the wave of presidential pardons issued by Donald Trump this week as “remarkably disgusting.”
Talking to CNNMcCabe said the president “is actively engaged in undermining the justice system that he is supposed to protect and defend.”
“These pardons are essentially the culmination of those acts of obstruction of justice,” which was quoted in the Mueller report, he added.
McCabe was fired by Trump’s first attorney general, Jeff Sessions, a day before his pension took effect. A Justice Department report said at the time that McCabe had exceeded his authority by allowing an aide to speak to him. Wall street journal about an FBI investigation into the Clinton Foundation.
McCabe criticized Trump for making it clear that in his circle it is worth not cooperating with the authorities.
“He will pay you with a pardon and give you a card to get out of jail,” he said.
The Mueller report raised the possibility that Trump’s campaign manager Paul Manafort chose not to work with authorities because he expected to be pardoned by Trump. Longtime Trump adviser Roger Stone also did not cooperate with the special counsel’s investigation and received a pardon and commutation prior to that.
A pardon is the complete removal of a criminal conviction, while a commutation is simply reducing someone’s sentence.
“What was seen and mentioned in the Mueller report has now been completed. The pardons were hung. And now they have been given in exchange for protection for the president. I don’t even know how to describe it, it is so obviously corrupt,” McCabe said.
Trump has issued 70 pardons and 24 commutations, according to the Justice Department. Trump has received 9,200 commute requests compared to President Obama’s 1,715 commutations and more than 33,000 requests. President George W. Bush commuted 11 sentences after more than 8,500 requests.
McCabe suggested that this was not the end of Trump’s pardon parade. “Where is he going now? Bannon is an obvious potential recipient … Giuliani has been reported to be interested in a clemency. He could surely use one, as the investigations in New York continue to heat up. And there really is no limit,” he said.
Republican Senator Ben Sasse issued a six-word statement Dec. 23 on Trump’s latest batch of pardons: “This is rotten to the core.”
The Nebraska senator issued the statement after “President Trump exercised his constitutional power to grant pardons to another group of criminals such as Manafort and Stone who flagrantly and repeatedly violated the law and harmed Americans,” said the statement from press.
Despite these comments, the only Republican senator who voted to convict Trump during impeachment was Utah’s Mitt Romney, who according to ProPublica boasted of not granting any clemency during his time as governor of Massachusetts from 2003 to 2007.
McCabe did not hold back when he went after the president, saying that “there is no limit in terms of the misfortune to which this president will submit”, to help his family and friends and punish his enemies.
He said: “This guy is actively using clemency to undermine justice. He is rewarding people who refused to cooperate, refused to provide information, who actively lied to prosecutors, courts and judges. We have never seen one. come down like this. We can go lower, “he said.
