New Judiciary Democrats Analysis Reveals Trump’s Corrupt Pardon Spree Cheated Crime Victims of $1.3 Billion

Washington, D.C. (June 17, 2025)—Today, Rep. Jamie Raskin, Ranking Member of the House Judiciary Committee, released a new Committee staff analysis revealing how President Donald Trump’s corrupt pardon spree will deprive victims and survivors of crime of $1.3 billion in restitution and fines owed to them and American taxpayers, allowing corporate fraudsters and tax cheats to keep their ill-gotten gains. Trump’s decision to wipe out restitution debts of fraudsters, millionaire tax evaders and other white-collar criminals will also severely deplete funds for victims’ assistance and compensation programs.

 Ranking Member Raskin issued the following statement on the Committee’s findings: 

“Our new analysis reveals that when President Trump issued a mass blanket pardon to 1,500 January 6 felons and dozens of mostly white-collar criminals, he wiped out $1.3 billion in restitution payments and fines they owed directly to their victims and to American taxpayers. While prior presidents overwhelmingly reserved pardons for those who accepted responsibility for their crimes, made full restitution to their victims and paid all their legal fines, Trump uses pardons not only to shorten the sentences of his political friends but to wipe out the debt they owe to their victims and to our society. 

“The Trump presidency is overseeing a massive transfer of wealth not only from the poor to the rich but from the innocent to the guilty. This is a golden age for politically connected criminal felons. The President has shown total contempt not just for police officers but for the victims and survivors of crime, cheating them and all of society out of the money rightfully owed to them by violent marauders and white-collar fraudsters. 

“In one case, Donald Trump pardoned a white-collar fraudster who took $4.4 million from his employees’ paychecks to purchase a yacht and other luxury items. Trump’s pardon not only saved the convicted fraudster and tax cheat from serving a single day of his 18-month prison sentence but allowed him to skip out on paying back the $4.4 million he stole. The $1 million that the pardoned criminal’s mother donated to a Trump fundraiser just a few weeks before the pardon issued was exceptionally well-invested. 

“Our analysis shows that Trump’s criminal pardon spree is, in addition to everything else, an astonishing giveaway to lawbreakers to keep the money they stole from their employees, their investors, and all the American taxpayers. Whoever said crime doesn’t pay has certainly not studied the Trump Administration.” 

Since beginning his second term, Donald Trump has pardoned or granted clemency to nearly 1,600 people, including fraudsters, crooked politicians, violent extremists, and unrepentant cop beaters. The House Judiciary Committee Democratic staff memo concludes that Trump’s pardons could deprive employees, investors, taxpayers and other victims of approximately $1.3 billion in restitution and fines owed to them. 

Trump’s move to wipe out the $1.3 billion in restitution and fines owed by his pardoned criminals also will likely affect funding for Victims of Crime Act (VOCA) grants, which are the primary source of federal funding for thousands of victim service providers across the nation, including programs serving victims of trafficking, drunk driving, domestic violence, sexual assault, and child abuse.

Trump’s use of his clemency power to erase restitution owed to victims is a sharp break with established practice. The traditional standards used by the Department of Justice (DOJ) in evaluating clemency petitions require that the individual seeking a pardon “has accepted responsibility for his or her criminal conduct and made restitution to its victims.” Trump’s decision to grant unconditional pardons to criminals with outstanding restitution obligations allows perpetrators to keep profiting from their crimes. 

Judiciary Democrats’ staff analysis uses data from the Office of the Pardon Attorney’s website and other publicly available court documents. Below are a few examples of how Trump’s corrupt pardons have deprived victims of the restitution funding they were owed: 

• At the time Trump pardoned the January 6th insurrectionists, including those who violently beat police, only 15% of the $3 million they owed in restitution to victims had been paid. The remaining $2.6 million was liquidated by the President’s pardons.
   
• Notorious tech entrepreneur Ross Ulbricht, who operated a major underground online marketplace used by drug dealers to traffic narcotics and opioids, was sentenced to life in prison before being pardoned by President Trump. Trump relieved him of the roughly $184 million in restitution and fines he owed.
   
• Jason Galanis, a “serial fraudster” and “con man” who was sentenced to 15 years in prison for his $80 million fraud scheme against union pension funds and a Native American tribe, was pardoned after serving as a witness in Republicans’ failed impeachment investigation against President Joe Biden. Trump’s pardon wiped out the $84.4 million in restitution he owed to the union workers and Native Americans he plundered.
   
• Paul Walczak, a tax criminal who withheld more than $10 million from the paychecks of his employees in order to fund a lavish lifestyle, was sentenced to 18 months in prison and ordered to pay $4.4 million in restitution. After Walczak’s mother donated $1 million to Trump at a Mar-A-Lago fundraiser, the President granted him a full pardon. Walczak did not return a single dollar to the victims of his crimes.
   
• Reality TV stars Todd and Julie Chrisley were granted pardons by Trump after their daughter spoke at the Republican National Convention and argued that her parents were victims of political prosecution—conveniently ignoring that they were indicted during the first Trump Administration. Trump’s pardon fully relieved the Chrisleys of the more than $22 million they owed to victims of their tax fraud and tax evasion scheme. Hours after their release from prison, Todd Chrisley bragged that “[t]he feds got f***ed.”

Click here to read the memo.