Trump Ended Santos's Restitution to Fraud Victims and Pardoned Men With Financial Ties to Him

Mercy for Santos, a Loss for His Victims

On October 17, 2025, Donald Trump freed George Santos from an 87-month fraud sentence and ended any further restitution to his victims.¹² A court had ordered Santos to repay $373,749.97; Trump's warrant relieved him of whatever remained unpaid.²¹ Trump announced the decision by praising the former congressman's Republican votes.³

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This is far worse than what George Santos did, and at least Santos had the Courage, Conviction, and Intelligence to ALWAYS VOTE REPUBLICAN!

This was Trump's own act: his warrant cut the sentence to time served and expressly ended further fines, restitution, probation and supervised release.¹

Executive Grant of Clemency, George Anthony Devolder Santos¹

AN IMMEDIATE COMMUTATION OF HIS ENTIRE SENTENCE To TIME SERVED WITH NO FURTHER FINES, RESTITUTION, PROBATION, SUPERVISED RELEASE, OR OTHER CONDITIONS

Santos's victims lost the right to further payment under that criminal restitution order while Santos gained his freedom.¹ He was the first of five; in less than nine months, Trump used the same power to relieve four more men connected to his financial or political interests of consequences for federal crimes: Binance's founder, a banker, a campaign donor and a member of his 2016 transition team.^456789101112

The grant was a commutation, which shortened Santos's sentence and left his convictions in place.¹¹³ The warrant does not name the separate $205,002.97 forfeiture order, and the $373,749.97 figure does not show how much remained unpaid.¹²

The Crimes Behind the Sentence

Santos's victims included his own supporters.² He pleaded guilty in August 2024 to wire fraud and aggravated identity theft, and Judge Joanna Seybert sentenced him on April 25, 2025.² He admitted additional criminal conduct for sentencing, including repeatedly charging campaign contributors' credit cards without permission and seeking out elderly victims suffering from cognitive impairment or decline.² Two supporters each sent $25,000 after being told their money would help elect him; Santos transferred the money to his personal accounts and spent much of it on personal expenses, including designer clothing and debts.²

U.S. Attorney John J. Durham described the sentence as accountability for "the mountain of lies, theft, and fraud he perpetrated."² The House had expelled Santos on December 1, 2023, by 311 votes to 114, including 105 Republican votes for expulsion.¹⁴

What Trump's Mercy Accomplished

Trump gave two reasons besides Santos's votes: that Senator Richard Blumenthal's statements about his military service were worse, and that Santos had endured long stretches of solitary confinement and mistreatment.³ AP reported that Santos considered the sentence overly harsh and politically motivated, and that Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene had urged a commutation.¹⁵

The sentencing judge had agreed with prosecutors that a stiffer sentence was warranted because Santos did not seem remorseful, AP also reported.¹⁵ NBC News reported that Santos had requested solitary confinement for his entire sentence before entering prison; Greene later said he was kept there for safety because of threats.¹⁶

Santos had been in prison 84 days: AP reported that he began serving the sentence on July 25, 2025, and Trump announced an immediate release on October 17, 175 days after sentencing.¹⁵³² NBC News reported his attorney's confirmation that Santos was released around 11 p.m. that night, which accomplished the President's stated goal.¹⁶³ The warrant did more than address prison conditions: it also ended repayment to victims.¹

New York Republicans criticized the result. NBC News reported that Representative Andrew Garbarino called a few months in prison for Santos "not justice" and that Representative Nick LaLota said his crimes warranted more than three months and urged him to spend the rest of his life showing remorse and making restitution.¹⁶

Trump's Financial Interest, Then Zhao's Pardon

Four days after the Santos commutation, on October 21, 2025, Trump pardoned Changpeng Zhao, the founder of Binance, an exchange that had taken a $2 billion investment paid in the Trump family's coin.⁵¹⁹¹⁷ Abu Dhabi's state-owned investment firm MGX made that investment earlier in the year and paid in USD1, the stablecoin issued by World Liberty Financial, CNBC reported.¹⁷ A stablecoin is a digital token designed to hold the value of one U.S. dollar; AP describes World Liberty as the crypto venture Trump and his sons Eric and Donald Jr. launched.⁹ Zhao remained a major Binance shareholder, CNBC reported.¹⁷

Trump reported $57,355,532 in token-sale income from World Liberty Financial, Inc., which his disclosure lists as 100% owned by WLF Holdco LLC, itself 75% owned by DT Marks Defi LLC.¹⁸ That income was reported for 2024, before the MGX transaction, and was not money from Binance; the $2 billion was an investment in Binance paid in World Liberty's coin, not a payment to Trump.¹⁸⁹¹⁷

CNBC also relayed The Wall Street Journal's report, based on sources familiar with the matter, that Binance helped build the technology behind USD1.¹⁷ In their October 28, 2025 letter, seven senators, citing The New York Times, said the MGX deal gave World Liberty a revenue stream that could be worth tens of millions of dollars annually to Trump and his family.¹⁹

Zhao had publicly requested a pardon.⁹ Binance's lobbyists disclosed work on executive relief; their filings neither define the term nor name the people the lobbyists met.²⁰ Baker & Hostetler registered effective February 10, 2025; Checkmate Government Relations followed effective September 20, reported $450,000 in income from Binance for the quarter ending September 30, and named the White House Office and Treasury Department as offices lobbied.²⁰ Checkmate posted that report on October 20, the day before the date on Trump's pardon warrant.²⁰⁵ CNBC reported that Checkmate's Charles McDowell is a friend of Donald Trump Jr.¹⁷ Trump's warrant granted a full and unconditional pardon and states no reason; the White House publicly confirmed it on October 23.⁵⁹

A Guilty Plea, Not a Finding of Innocence

On November 21, 2023, Zhao pleaded guilty to failing to maintain an effective anti-money-laundering program under the Bank Secrecy Act and resigned as Binance's chief executive.²¹ Binance separately pleaded guilty and agreed to a financial penalty of $4,316,126,163, more than $4.3 billion.²¹

By the Justice Department's account of Binance's admitted conduct, the exchange helped valuable U.S. customers conceal their locations, never filed a suspicious activity report with FinCEN, and willfully caused over $898 million in trades between U.S. users and users ordinarily resident in Iran between January 2018 and May 2022.²¹ Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Binance's failures allowed money to flow to terrorists, cybercriminals and child abusers.²¹ DOJ also described Zhao's personal role: he admitted knowing that Binance served U.S. users and needed an anti-money-laundering program, and he joined a plan to help valuable U.S. customers move their holdings into offshore-entity accounts.²¹

Prosecutors requested 36 months in prison, above their stated advisory range of 12 to 18 months; the court imposed four months and a $50,000,000 fine on April 30, 2024.²²⁴ Zhao left prison in September 2024, CNBC reported, so his prison term was already served when Trump pardoned him: the pardon addressed his conviction, rather than freeing him from prison.¹⁷⁹

The Defense, and What It Does Not Answer

The White House said the previous administration wanted to punish the cryptocurrency industry and that there were "no allegations of fraud or identifiable victims."⁹ In a CBS interview published November 2, 2025, Trump said he did not know who Zhao was and had heard his case was a "Biden witch hunt."²³ Asked about the $2 billion transaction, he said he knew nothing about it.²³ The Block later reported press secretary Karoline Leavitt's clarification: Trump meant he did not know Zhao personally, and qualified lawyers at the Justice Department and White House Counsel's Office had reviewed the pardon request.²⁴

Zhao told CNBC in January 2026 that MGX chose USD1, that Binance subsequently converted the investment out of it in portions, and that he had no business relationship with the Trumps and had not spoken directly with the President.¹⁷ He denied knowing of any pardon deal, and World Liberty said it had no role in the pardon process.¹⁷

A pardon is mercy, not an acquittal. Zhao pleaded guilty, and Binance admitted sanctions violations and failures that allowed criminal proceeds through its platform; the absence of a fraud charge does not answer those admissions.²¹ Trump used presidential authority to pardon the founder of an exchange whose $2 billion investment had used a coin issued by his family's venture.⁵¹⁷⁹

On October 28, 2025, seven senators asked Attorney General Pamela Bondi and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent whether Trump's business ties to Zhao influenced the pardon.¹⁹

The Donations and the Charge Reduction

Trump twice pardoned Julio Herrera Velutini, a banker charged with bribery, after $3.5 million reached MAGA Inc., which NBC News describes as Trump's super PAC, from a donor the network identifies as his daughter.^25410262728 Federal election records list two contributions from Isabela Herrera, a self-employed financial consultant: $2,500,000 on December 31, 2024, and $1,000,000 on July 22, 2025.²⁶²⁷

Herrera Velutini lived in London and owned an international bank in San Juan.¹⁰ In August 2022, federal prosecutors charged him, former Puerto Rico governor Wanda Vázquez Garced and former FBI agent Mark Rossini with conspiracy, federal programs bribery and honest services wire fraud.¹⁰ They alleged that Herrera Velutini and Rossini promised money for Vázquez's campaign in exchange for removing the regulator examining his bank and replacing that official with someone Herrera Velutini chose.¹⁰ Each defendant faced a maximum total penalty of 20 years in prison; the accusations never reached a trial verdict.¹⁰²⁹

The first MAGA Inc. contribution arrived while that indictment was pending.²⁶²⁹ On June 30, 2025, prosecutors filed a misdemeanor campaign-finance charge against each defendant instead of pursuing the felony charges; Herrera Velutini's was contribution by a foreign national under 52 U.S.C. § 30121.²⁹³⁰⁴ The second contribution followed 22 days later.²⁷ On August 27, 36 days after that contribution, Herrera Velutini pleaded guilty to the foreign-national count.³¹³⁰

Judge Silvia Carreño-Coll, whom Trump nominated to the district court in 2019, had denied several challenges to the indictment before prosecutors changed course.²⁹³² She called the new penalty "a mere slap on the wrist" and the misdemeanor "an offense that lacerates the integrity of our democratic electoral process."²⁹ She wrote that the change followed directives "presumably issued by Main Justice," naming no official.²⁹ She also ruled that prosecutors were entitled to make the change and that she had to respect their discretion: her criticism was not a finding that the charge reduction was unlawful, nor does her order attribute it to Trump.²⁹

Trump Removed Even the Misdemeanor Consequences

Trump then pardoned Herrera Velutini, Vázquez and Rossini in the original bribery case on January 15, 2026.²⁵ Those grants did not cover the separate cases in which the defendants had pleaded guilty, so prosecutors told the court that further pardons would follow.²⁵ The Pardon Attorney's list records the second round under January 20: six pardons across the three defendants in five days.⁴²⁵ Herrera Velutini's second warrant expressly covers his misdemeanor case and grants a full and unconditional pardon.⁶

Herrera Velutini received both grants before sentencing; the official list records no sentence for him.⁴ On January 27, Judge Carreño-Coll dismissed his foreign-national contribution case as moot in view of the pardon and his acceptance of it.³⁰ Trump's intervention therefore ended the case before a judge could impose punishment for the offense to which Herrera Velutini had pleaded guilty.³¹⁴³⁰

Campaign Legal Center, an advocacy group, alleged in an FEC complaint dated February 17, 2026, that the $3.5 million actually came from Herrera Velutini through his daughter and was a payment for clemency.³³ It described its evidence as circumstantial, citing her age of 25, a prior federal giving history consisting of a single $20 contribution, and the timing of the gifts and clemency.³³

The White House called the prosecution political and cited Vázquez's pardon materials as denying any quid pro quo in the alleged bribery scheme.²⁸ The official said Vázquez regarded the discussions as agreement on policy with a potential donor, not action in exchange for material gain; Herrera Velutini's attorney said the evidence did not support the dropped charges.²⁸ It also told CBS News that the donations had nothing to do with the pardon.³⁴ That defense disputes the connection between money and clemency; it does not undo the guilty plea or the pardons.³¹²⁵⁴

Kidan's Contributions and His Pardon

Trump gave Adam R. Kidan a full and unconditional pardon, listed among 17 pardons on July 3, 2026.⁷⁴ Kidan, a former business partner of lobbyist Jack Abramoff, pleaded guilty in 2005 to fraud and conspiracy in the purchase of a fleet of gambling boats, AP reported.³⁵ On March 29, 2006, the court sentenced him to 70 months in prison and ordered $21,701,015.45 in restitution.⁴

Florida Bulldog reported that the defendant in that fraud was the Trump donor, that he contributed more than $1.13 million during the 2024 campaign to Trump's campaign and committees supporting him, and that he held his wedding at Mar-a-Lago on the weekend of February 18, 2023, with Trump and Melania Trump attending.¹¹ FEC records show an Adam R. Kidan of Palm Beach Gardens giving Trump 47 Committee, Inc. $220,500 on September 24, 2024, and an Adam Kidan in the same city giving $50,000 on April 13.³⁶ Other entries identify an Adam R. Kidan there as president of Empire Workforce Solutions, the employer the White House named for the man Trump pardoned.³⁶³⁵

Florida Bulldog also names Aristotle and Alexander Hren-Boulis among Kidan's victims and reports that it found no indication in his court file of restitution payments, while acknowledging that payments could have occurred outside that file.¹¹ The official clemency list gives the 2006 restitution order, and the warrant does not mention restitution; neither says how much of the $21,701,015.45 remained unpaid in 2026.⁴⁷

AP reported the White House's account of Kidan's work after leaving prison in 2009, including founding a staffing business and later running Empire Workforce Solutions; he was also well beyond the Justice Department's normal five-year wait.³⁵³⁷ Those facts support a case for mercy.³⁵³⁷ His donations, including the $220,500 Trump 47 Committee contribution about 21 months before the pardon, and his Mar-a-Lago wedding establish a connection to the President beyond an ordinary applicant's petition.³⁶⁴¹¹

Buyer: Endorsements Instead of an Explanation of the Crime

Stephen E. Buyer, a former Indiana congressman, served on Trump's 2016 transition team, focusing on veterans' issues, according to a Fox 5 report drawing on AP material.¹² On June 4, 2026, Trump pardoned him in a proclamation issued on the advice of 53 named endorsers: two senators, five representatives and 46 people styled Hon.⁸ The Fox 5 report identifies the five representatives as current House Republicans and says more than 40 former Republican members of Congress signed a separate letter for Buyer.¹²

The proclamation praises Buyer's Army and congressional career as "distinguished and highly productive" but does not mention his offense.⁸ A jury convicted him of four securities-fraud counts for two insider trading schemes, and the court sentenced him on September 19, 2023, to 22 months in prison.³⁸ Prosecutors described how Buyer used confidential merger information entrusted to him as a consultant to buy shares before the public announcements, and reported that Judge Richard M. Berman found his false trial explanations constituted obstruction of justice.³⁸

The clemency list records three years of supervised release, $765,912.61 in amended restitution and a $10,000 fine, along with the prison term.⁴ The Fox 5 report says Buyer was released in 2025 and describes his claim that the pardon corrected a politically motivated prosecution.¹² Trump's proclamation identifies distinguished service and endorsements, rather than an error in the jury's verdict, as its grounds for mercy.⁸

Nearly 6,000 Denials in the Ordinary Queue

In July 2026, the month Trump pardoned Kidan, nearly 6,000 clemency applications were denied, The New York Times reported, from people who mostly lacked political connections and had waited in the ordinary queue.¹³⁴ Its account, carried by The Boston Globe, identified more than 300 pardon denials and more than 5,600 commutation denials.¹³ The letter announcing them did not say whether Trump had personally reviewed and rejected the applications.¹³

White House pardon official Alice Marie Johnson had invited university clemency clinics to submit candidates deserving a second chance, the same report said.¹³ The University of St. Thomas School of Law submitted more than 15 applications; professor Mark Osler said four had been rejected and, at the time of that July report, the rest were pending.¹³ The report described hopes for as many as 250 clemency grants around July 4, which a White House official called a staff idea, not a plan.¹³ Trump issued fewer than 20 pardons on July 3, including Kidan's.¹³⁴

Batch denials are not unusual: the Times noted that Joe Biden denied nearly 6,000 pardon applications in his final days and granted thousands of commutations.¹³ The disparity is the contrast the Times reported, between mostly unconnected petitioners waiting in line and allies obtaining clemency.¹³ The clemency grants do not say whether these recipients used the Justice Department's petition process.⁴⁵⁶⁷⁸¹

The Strongest Legal Defense Is Correct, but Incomplete

The strongest defense is the law itself. The Constitution gives the pardon power to the President, and the Supreme Court held in Ex parte Garland and Schick v. Reed that Congress cannot narrow that power by statute.³⁹⁴⁰⁴¹ The Justice Department's five-year waiting period governs petitions to the Department, not the President: its rules expressly state that they are advisory and do not restrict his constitutional authority.³⁷⁴² Zhao received his pardon about 13 months after leaving prison and Herrera Velutini before sentencing, but neither departure from the ordinary timetable invalidates a grant.¹⁷⁴⁴²

Trump v. United States gives the President absolute criminal immunity for acts within his exclusive constitutional authority and identifies pardoning as such a power.⁴³ Presidents of both parties have also granted contested clemency.⁴⁴¹³ The House committee majority investigating Bill Clinton's pardon of Marc Rich reported more than $1.1 million in political contributions by Denise Rich and her daughters and $450,000 from Denise Rich to the Clinton Library; it found circumstantial evidence supporting an appearance of impropriety but could not conclude whether the contributions affected the pardon.⁴⁴ The report included minority views and was not an impeachment precedent.⁴⁴ Biden pardoned his son and other family members, as the Times noted.¹³

A valid grant is still open to impeachment scrutiny.³⁹⁴⁵ The Court's ban on examining presidential motives applies when courts decide whether conduct is official; it does not bar Congress from considering impeachment.⁴³ In Ex parte Grossman, the Court identified impeachment as a possible response if repeated pardons prevented a court from enforcing its orders.⁴⁵

These financial connections do not prove an agreement to exchange money for clemency or establish what Trump knew about the transactions when granting it.^46172334 The charge is favoritism and conflicts of interest in the use of a public power.

The President Is Responsible for These Grants

The responsibility for these grants is Trump's: he directed the warrants, publicly announced Santos's commutation, defended Zhao's pardon and proclaimed Buyer's.^15673238 As of October 10, 2026, the Justice Department's list records clemency for all five men, dated from October 17, 2025, to July 3, 2026, less than nine months.⁴

Trump used a public power to relieve men connected to his financial or political interests of consequences for federal crimes.^{15678317283611} For Santos, he ended further restitution to fraud victims on a $373,749.97 court order while praising the recipient's Republican votes.¹²³ Those are concrete grounds for impeachment scrutiny: conflicts and favoritism in presidential clemency, with victims bearing a cost that Trump chose to remove from the offender.³⁹⁴⁵¹