President Donald Trump has pardoned Rudy Giuliani and scores of others accused of involvement in the effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election, Trump's pardon attorney said late Sunday.
Ed Martin posted a proclamation on X, which says Giuliani and scores of others will be pardoned for alleged activities linked to the 2020 election. Martin was replying to his own X message from May in which he said "No MAGA left behind."
Trump has yet to comment publicly. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the people listed on the proclamation “were persecuted and put through hell by the Biden Administration for challenging an election, which is the cornerstone of democracy. Getting prosecuted for challenging results is something that happens in communist Venezuela, not the United States of America, and President Trump is putting an end to the Biden Regime’s communist tactics once and for all.”
The list of 77 people also includes other high-profile Trump allies including attorneys Sidney Powell, John Eastman and Kenneth Chesebro, and Trump's chief of staff in 2020, Mark Meadows. The pardon is written in broad language that exonerates "all" citizens accused of election interference.
The pardons are largely symbolic as none of the people listed were convicted of federal crimes, which the presidential pardon covers. Several of those pardoned had already had their charges dropped by state courts.
"I, DONALD J. TRUMP, do hereby grant a full, complete, and unconditional pardon to all United States citizens for conduct relating to the advice, creation, organization, execution, submission, support, voting, activities in, or advocacy for or of any slate of presidential electors ... in connection with the 2020 Presidential Election," the proclamation posted by Martin read.
The pardons also relate to "any conduct relating to their efforts to expose voting fraud and vulnerabilities in the 2020 Presidential Election," it says.
The notice, which says it was signed by Trump on Nov. 7, adds that the pardon does not extend to the president himself.
In a statement, Giuliani's spokesperson, Ted Goodman, said the former mayor "stands by his work following the 2020 presidential election," saying Giuliani was responding to the "legitimate concerns" of thousands of voters. He said Giuliani was "deeply grateful" for Trump’s decision and called for the reinstatement of his law license.
Giuliani was disbarred in New York and in Washington, D.C., over his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
Since returning to office Trump has sought to undo the narrative — established by an 18-month investigation by the House Jan. 6 Committee — that he oversaw efforts to overturn the result of the 2020 election, culminating in his supporters marching on the Capitol on the day Congress was to formalize Joe Biden's victory.
Giuliani was found to be in contempt of court by a federal court in January for not complying with orders to hand over information about his assets to two Georgia election workers he defamed. Trump said in September he would award his former attorney the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the country's highest civilian honor.
In January this year, Trump issued 1,500 pardons and commuted the sentences of 14 of his supporters who were connected with the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, including members of the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers groups who were convicted of seditious conspiracy.
Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., who was speaker of the House during that attack, called those January pardons "an outrageous insult to our justice system."
