2026年5月7日 / 美国东部时间凌晨5:00 / 哥伦比亚广播公司新闻
据哥伦比亚广播公司新闻获得的信件显示，参众两院民主党人已展开调查，以查明特朗普总统此前签发的赦免和减刑决定是否由“利益输送机制”驱动。
议员们调查的赦免对象包括：因洗钱罪名认罪的加密货币亿万富翁赵长鹏；因税务犯罪被定罪的养老院运营商约瑟夫·施瓦茨；以及2023年因向投资者撒谎罪名成立、被判四年监禁的企业家特雷弗·米尔顿。
周四，加利福尼亚州众议员戴夫·明和劳尔·鲁伊斯，以及佛蒙特州参议员彼得·韦尔奇向十余名行政赦免获得者致信，要求查明他们如何“通过中间人、财务捐款或其他形式的影响力”从特朗普先生或其顾问处获得优待。
民主党人还在调查赦免和减刑对数千名金融受害者的影响。信件中指出，特朗普先生的赦免行为“剥夺了受害者获得赔偿和正义的权利”，并提到总统免除了数亿美元的受害者赔偿款和罚款。
在特朗普第二任期内，其赦免或减刑多名面临起诉的盟友——以及雇佣其亲信的人士——的行为一直受到审查。民主党人在信中辩称，总统似乎以违背最高法院将行政赦免描述为“为‘公共福利’行使的‘恩典行为’”的方式奖励其盟友。
议员们要求提供相关合同，以证明赦免获得者向为其向特朗普先生游说的律师、说客、社交媒体影响者及其他人士支付的费用金额。
他们还要求提供赦免获得者或其代表与联邦官员之间的通讯记录、显示向特朗普先生或其关联组织捐款的相关记录，以及与赦免游说相关的其他文件。
“如果他们不配合，可能会让自己成为焦点——成为未来国会调查的对象，也会为潜在的进一步刑事起诉招来更多针对他们的目标，”明在接受哥伦比亚广播公司新闻采访时表示，并补充称，定罪后有人能“绕过司法体系”的说法“触及了本届政府治下美国当前乱象的核心”。
由于民主党在参众两院均处于少数派地位，他们没有传票权，只能请求赦免获得者合作。但如果民主党在今年的中期选举中夺回参众两院多数席位，这种不寻常的赦免流程很可能会成为民主党优先监督的领域之一。届时他们将有权强制要求提供赦免相关及其他监督领域的文件。
议员们调查的最引人注目的赦免行为之一，是特朗普先生去年对加密货币交易所币安创始人赵长鹏的赦免。联邦披露信息显示，赦免游说由小唐纳德·特朗普的朋友、律师兼说客切斯·麦克道尔，以及曾代表特朗普中东特使史蒂夫·威特科夫之子扎克·威特科夫的律师特雷莎·古迪·吉伦牵头。
在给赵长鹏的信中，民主党人援引相关报道称，币安与由特朗普家族和威特科夫家族创立的加密公司World Liberty Financial建立了合作关系。信中写道：“公开报道还显示，你和币安在为特朗普家族的加密业务促成巨额投资方面发挥了重要作用，使特朗普稳定币估值达到21亿美元。”
白宫否认对赵长鹏的赦免及其他赦免行为存在不当行为。新闻秘书卡罗琳·莱维特表示，任何“花钱游说赦免的人都是在愚蠢地浪费金钱”，且本届政府拥有“严格的赦免审查程序”。吉伦也表示不存在“交换条件”。
“特朗普总统滥用总统赦免权，让罪犯逍遥法外，剥夺了受害者数亿美元的赔偿款，却几乎没有给出任何解释，”负责监督司法部赦免工作的参议院司法委员会成员韦尔奇说道。司法部传统上负责处理赦免和减刑事务，但前赦免律师莉兹·奥耶此前曾告诉哥伦比亚广播公司新闻，特朗普政府“似乎绕过”该机构，而非与其合作“审查和评估赦免申请”。
“这背离了100多年来的惯例，”奥耶说道，她声称赦免事务一直在白宫办理，“未征求赦免律师办公室的意见”。
致赦免获得者的信件要求他们在5月22日前回复。
据《纽约时报》报道，施瓦茨对其经营的养老院涉及3800万美元工资税诈骗的罪名认罪，在纽约市外服完三年刑期的三个月后，特朗普先生便对其予以赦免。此事发生在施瓦茨向与总统亲近的右翼特工和律师，以及特朗普的“赦免沙皇”爱丽丝·玛丽·约翰逊支付款项之后。
议员们还在调查对前医疗高管劳伦斯·杜兰的赦免——杜兰因医保诈骗被定罪，特朗普先生对其减刑，免除了8700万美元的赔偿款。他们还向尼古拉公司创始人特雷弗·米尔顿发送了质询函。
2025年3月，特朗普先生赦免了米尔顿，使其无需向股东支付约6.8亿美元的赔偿款。此事发生在米尔顿及其妻子向特朗普2024年竞选活动及其关联政治团体捐赠至少300万美元之后。
一名白宫官员今年早些时候表示，米尔顿的捐款“绝对没有”影响到对他的赦免。
其他面临国会审查的人士包括：已被赦免的税务欺诈者保罗·瓦尔扎克，其母亲为特朗普先生筹集了数百万美元资金；以及房地产开发商蒂莫西·莱韦克——他在因涉嫌合同招标舞弊被定罪后，雇佣了律师兼特朗普盟友特雷·高迪，随后获得赦免。赦免后，司法部高级官员“感觉完全被总统踩在了脚下”，一名前特朗普政府官员告诉《自由报》。
“更让我恼火的是，本该用于偿还诈骗受害者的赔偿款被剥夺，”众议院监督委员会成员明在接受哥伦比亚广播公司新闻采访时表示。
“如今受害者遭受了双重打击：那些诈骗他们的人不仅没有服刑——没有向社会偿还债务——他们甚至都没有向被他们诈骗的人偿还债务，”这位众议员补充道。
Trump pardon recipients face congressional investigation over “pay-to-play” questions
May 7, 2026 / 5:00 AM EDT / CBS News
Senate and House Democrats have launched an investigation into whether pardons and commutations issued by President Trump were driven by “pay-to-play dynamics,” according to letters obtained by CBS News.
Among the pardons being probed by lawmakers are those granted to cryptocurrency billionaire Changpeng Zhao, who pleaded guilty to money laundering; nursing home operator Joseph Schwartz, who was convicted of tax crimes; and entrepreneur Trevor Milton, sentenced to four years in prison in 2023 after being convicted of lying to investors.
On Thursday, California congressmen Dave Min and Raul Ruiz, as well as Vermont senator Peter Welch sent letters to more than a dozen recipients of executive clemency — seeking to unearth how they may have received favorable treatment from Mr. Trump or his advisers “through intermediaries, financial contributions, or other forms of influence.”
The Democrats are also examining the impact of pardons and commutations on thousands of financial victims. The letters note that Mr. Trump’s acts of clemency are “depriving victims of compensation and justice,” citing the president’s elimination of hundreds of millions of dollars in restitution — money owed to crime victims — and fines.
Clemency has come under scrutiny during Mr. Trump’s second term with his pardons or commutations of the sentences of a number of allies who faced prosecution —as well as those who hired people close to him. In the letters, the Democrats argued the president has appeared to reward his allies in a manner that departs from the Supreme Court’s description of executive clemency “as ‘an act of grace’ exercised for the ‘public welfare.’”
The lawmakers asked for any contracts showing how much money has been paid by the clemency recipients to lawyers, lobbyists, social media influencers and others who advocated on their behalf to Mr. Trump.
File photos of former Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao; real estate developer Timothy Leiweke; and Trevor Milton, founder of Nikola Corp. Getty Images
They also requested communications between the recipients or people acting on their behalf with federal officials, records showing any donations to Mr. Trump or groups affiliated with him and other documents related to clemency efforts.
“If they don’t respond, they run the risk of highlighting themselves — of being the subjects of future congressional investigations and creating more of a target on their backs for potential further criminal prosecutions,” Min told CBS News, adding that the idea that people can “get around the justice system” after being convicted “gets to the heart of what is wrong with America right now under this administration.”
Because Democrats are in the minority in both the House and the Senate, they lack subpoena power and can only request cooperation from the pardon recipients. But this unusual pipeline for clemency will likely be a top oversight area for Democrats should they take back majorities in either chamber of Congress in the midterm elections this year. That would give them the authority to compel documents on clemency and other areas of oversight.
Perhaps the most high-profile clemency act that the lawmakers are investigating is Mr. Trump’s pardon last year of Zhao, the founder of crypto exchange Binance. Federal disclosures show that the clemency push was led by Ches McDowell, a lawyer and lobbyist who is a friend of Donald Trump Jr., as well as Teresa Goody Guillén, a lawyer who has represented Zach Witkoff, the son of Mr. Trump’s Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff.
In a letter to Zhao, Democrats cited reporting on how Binance partnered with World Liberty Financial, a crypto company founded by the Trump and Witkoff families. “Public reporting also indicates that you and Binance played an important role in brokering a massive investment in the Trump family’s crypto business, surging the Trump Stablecoin to a $2.1 billion valuation,” the letter read.
The White House denied any impropriety in the Zhao pardon and others. Press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that anyone “spending money to lobby for pardons is foolishly wasting their money” and that the administration has a “robust pardon review process.” Goody Guillén has also said there was no “quid pro quo.”
“President Trump’s abuse of the presidential pardon has let criminals walk free and deprived victims of hundreds of millions of dollars in restitution, with little to no explanation,” said Welch, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which oversees clemency at the Department of Justice. The DOJ traditionally handles pardons and commutations but its former pardon attorney, Liz Oyer, previously told CBS News that the Trump administration “appears to be working around” the agency rather than with it “to vet and review applications for pardons.”
“This was a departure from over 100 years of practice,” Oyer said, claiming that clemency has been run out of the White House “without input from the Office of the Pardon Attorney.”
The letters to the clemency recipients asked for responses by May 22.
Schwartz, who pleaded guilty to charges stemming from a $38 million payroll tax fraud scheme involving nursing homes he owned, had served just three months of his three-year prison sentence outside New York City when Mr. Trump pardoned him. It followed Schwartz’s payments to right-wing operatives and lawyers who are close to the president and Alice Marie Johnson, Mr. Trump’s “pardon czar,” the New York Times reported.
The lawmakers are also probing clemency to former healthcare executive Lawrence Duran — who was convicted of Medicare fraud and received a commutation from Mr. Trump wiping away $87 million in owed restitution. And they sent questions to Milton, the founder of the since-bankrupt automotive company Nikola.
In March 2025, Mr. Trump pardoned Milton — letting him off the hook for roughly $680 million in restitution to shareholders. It came after Milton and his wife donated at least $3 million to Mr. Trump’s 2024 campaign and other political groups in his orbit.
A White House official said earlier this year that Milton’s donations “played absolutely no role” in his pardon.
Others facing congressional scrutiny include former private equity executive David Gentile, who was convicted of running a $1.6 billion Ponzi scheme and saw his $15.5 million in restitution wiped away when Mr. Trump commuted his sentence. Senate Democrats raised concerns about the commutation last December — arguing that it “represents a betrayal of more than 17,000 innocent Americans from all walks of the political spectrum that lost over $1 billion in life savings because of his crimes.”
Also receiving letters were Paul Walczak, a pardoned tax cheat whose mother raised millions of dollars for Mr. Trump, and real estate developer Timothy Leiweke — who was pardoned after hiring lawyer and Trump ally Trey Gowdy following a conviction for alleged contract bid rigging. After that pardon, senior Justice Department officials “felt completely kneecapped by the president,” a former Trump administration official told The Free Press.
“The thing that rankles me even further is the deprivation of restitution, money that they were supposed to pay back to the victims of their frauds,” Min, a member of the House Oversight Committee, told CBS News.
“Now the victims get hit twice, because not only are the people that defrauded them not serving their time — not paying their debt to society — they’re literally not paying their debts to the people they defrauded,” the congressman added.
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