A running list of all the celebrities Trump has pardoned

For as long as he has been a public figure at the nexus of power and finance, President Donald Trump has been in love with celebrity — especially his own — and celebrities, with whom he’s spent a lifetime socializing. From splashy Manhattan nightclub appearances to his star-studded reality television shows and now oval office photoshoots, Trump’s embrace of stardom even extends into the heart of the federal criminal justice system. Across both his terms in office, the president has seemingly gone out of his way to pardon a cavalcade of high profile celebrity offenders — often ones with whom he shares a personal connection — for crimes ranging from gun offenses to financial fraud.

After earning plaudits in his first term for his criminal justice reform work, here are the celebrities and notables Trump has pardoned since assuming the presidency.

Todd and Julie Chrisley

Convicted in 2022 on a host of financial and fraud-related charges, the eponymous stars of USA Network's "Chrisley Knows Best" hid their crimes behind their "self-presentation as self-made businesspeople," said The New York Times. The Chrisleys "don't look like terrorists to me," Trump reportedly told the pair's daughter, Savannah, while announcing the Spring 2025 pardons, Savannah said to NewsNation. "I don't know them, but give them my regards and wish them good luck," Trump added.

The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

The pair have been "unfairly targeted and overly prosecuted by an unjust justice system," said White House spokesperson Harrison Fields in a statement to NBC News upon the pardon announcement. The family is now slated to appear in a new reality show, greenlit just days before the Chrisleys were officially pardoned on May 28, in which they will be "exposing the raw truth of their lives — past and present," per an official synopsis provided to People.

George Santos

During his brief stint in congress, former Republican Rep.George Santos made a name for himself as one of the most transparently fraudulent lawmakers in recent memory, while also luxuriating in intense public spotlight. Nevertheless, Trump’s October 2025 decision to commute Santos’ seven-year prison sentence for wire fraud was the “latest in his flagrant misuse of the pardon power,” USA Today said. The commutation is further proof that Trump sees the justice system “through a pretty clear lens” as being “weaponized against people who Democrats politically disagree with,” The New York Times reporter Michael Gold said to National Public Radio.

Jay Johnston

From his televised beginnings on cult favorite "Mr. Show" to his starring role on "Bob's Burgers," actor and comedian Jay Johnston was a mainstay on television screens for years until he was arrested and convicted for joining the mob of MAGA supporters who breached the U.S. Capitol building on Jan. 6, 2021. Johnston was ultimately sentenced to more than a year in prison in part for having "cracked jokes and interacted with other rioters as he used a cellphone to record the violence around him," said NPR.

Johnston was ultimately pardoned in one of Trump's first presidential acts of his second term, along with hundreds of other Jan. 6 participants. Trump politicized the arrests and imprisonments of many Capitol rioters during the run-up to the 2024 election.

Rudy Giuliani

While perhaps not a “celebrity” in the traditional sense, former New York City Mayor-turned-Trump-attack-dog Rudy Giuliani was already among the president’s highest profile associates even before the president pardoned his onetime attorney for Giuliani’s role in Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election results. The pardon, which came alongside similar acts of clemency for Trump’s other 2020 electoral associates in November 2025, is “primarily symbolic” since “none of those named” in the latest batch of pardons are “currently facing federal charges,” The New York Times said. The federal pardons, then, are “part of a long-shot gambit” to “influence the state-level charges” faced by Giuliani and others by serving as a “persuasive authority for the argument that the cases should be tossed out,” said The Independent

NBA YoungBoy

Born Kentrell Gaulden, rapper NBA YoungBoy ended "more than five years of legal morass" by pleading guilty to gun-related charges in multiple states in December of last year, The New York Times said, only to be made a free man as part of the president's May 28 pardon spree in late May. Gaulden's legal saga has "come to a conclusion," said attorney Drew Findling, who previously served as Trump's personal legal counsel during the since-closed Georgia election interference case. The rapper can now "concentrate on first and foremost his family, and then, of course, his amazing career," Findling said to the Times.

"I want to thank President Trump for granting me a pardon and giving me the opportunity to keep building — as a man, as a father and as an artist," the rapper said in a statement posted to social media after his release. Trump's pardon means the artist "won't have to follow the terms of his probation, including drug testing," said The Associated Press. YoungBoy's post-pardon tour has avoided "references to Donald Trump," Rolling Stone said, "even though his latest album, MASA, short for 'Make America Slime Again,' is a reference to Trump as a political figure."

Lil Wayne

The president's January 2021 pardon of rap superstar Lil Wayne, born Dwayne Michael Carter Jr., came after speculation that the rapper was "angling for a pardon" after he "unexpectedly shared a photo" of himself and Trump during the 2020 campaign, Rolling Stone said. Carter, who pleaded guilty to felony gun possession in 2020 and faced up to a decade in prison, had exhibited his "generosity" through a "commitment to a variety of charities, including donations to research hospitals and a host of food banks," the White House said when it announced his pardon.

Rod Blagojevich

After initially commuting a raft of sentences (including wire fraud, solicitation of bribes and lying to the FBI) against disgraced former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich in 2020, Trump waited until Feb. 10, 2025, to fully pardon the Democratic lawmaker. The self-proclaimed "Trumpocrat" hailed the president as a "great effing guy" in response.

Following his initial commutation, Blagojevich had become a "fierce defender of Trump as the president has faced his own legal battles," Politico said. The pair's relationship stretches back to Blagojevich's time as a cast member of Trump's popular NBC reality competition "The Apprentice," from which he was fired in the 4th week.

Michael 'Harry-O' Harris

While perhaps not a household name, Michael "Harry-O" Harris has been an instrumental figure in the music industry and hip-hop community, co-founding Death Row Records while behind bars for drug charges and attempted murder. During his incarceration, Harris not only helped launch the iconic rap label but also "negotiated deals with a variety of mainstream music labels," said the Los Angeles Times. Like Blagojevich, Harris had initially had his sentence commuted by Trump at the end of the president's first term, before being pardoned entirely as part of Trump's May clemency acts.

"This freedom is a gift," Harris said in a statement posted to Instagram thanking Trump and daughter Ivanka, as well as "Pardon-czar" Alice Marie Johnson, who has advised Trump on his clemency efforts following her own sentence commutation and eventual pardoning for drug-related offenses. "I will not waste it."

Kodak Black

Sentenced to nearly four years behind bars on federal weapons charges, rapper Kodak Black, born Bill Kapri, was initially granted clemency at the end of Trump's first term alongside fellow hip-hop star Lil Wayne. Black is a "prominent artist and community leader" who "committed to supporting a variety of charitable efforts, such as providing educational resources to students and families of fallen law enforcement officers and the underprivileged," the White House said while announcing his commuted sentence.

The "campaign" for Kapri's freedom was backed by a host of religious figures, "including Ohio pastor and former Trump advisor Darrell Scott," as well as former New York City Police Commissioner Bernie Kerik, who was "himself pardoned by Trump" one year prior, said the BBC. Since his pardon, Black has become "very loyal to Trump," XXL Magazine said. Asked in the run up to the 2024 election whether he'd vote for Trump, Black said, "we should have Donald Trump for like 20 years like how Russian and all that sh*t be doin." That summer, he also released a pro-Trump song, "ONBOA47RD," and attended the president's inauguration ball in January.