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Have pardons ever been realistically used as a political check against other branches like this? If I squinted I could maybe see something like Carter's pardoning of draft dodgers or Obama's pardoning of non-violent drug offenders, but neither of those really seem like they'd fit that well. I don't think it works that well as a check even if it had been. The real check the Executive has over the Legislative is the ability to dominate one party of the split chambers which has effectively rendered Congress inert. Kicking the can to pardons being punished by the President's relationship with Congress also doesn't work that well since, again, that implicitly relies on voters punishing politicians who don't do what they want. If they don't really punish the President, why would they be expected to punish Congress indirectly?
I disagree with the notion that the J6 protestors were politically prosecuted, at least insofar as participating in Trump's self-coup wasn't already political. The median sentence was 60 days, with those receiving substantially longer sentences mostly having engaged in violence. I don't like the framing of comparing it to BLM leniency, because two wrongs don't make a right. This isn't a prisoner's dilemma, it's just blatant hypocrisy. If anything, this will just make the situation worse as Democrats can now use this pardon to do another round of their own nonsense when they retake the White House at some point.
Jefferson pardoned everyone who had been charged under the Sedition Act. His party had taken power with a mandate to remove them, and I guess he was implementing his part.
I’m willing to bet that pardons were part of the normal political sausage-making that was the norm through…I don’t know when it fell apart. Reagan? Clinton?
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Yes, just now.
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