Gubernatorial Pardons to Defeat Deportation vs. State 'Take Care' Requirements
By Dan Cadman on August 9, 2019
I recently addressed the fact that Attorney General William Barr had certified to himself a case involving reduction of a sentence by a state judge who had done so for the clear purpose of defeating the immigration laws. (See here and here.) The post-facto reduction of a sentence, occurring significantly after conviction and the original passing of sentence, was designed to provide an "escape chute" for an alien whose conviction and initial sentence rendered him removable and ineligible for relief.
I mentioned in those posts that this phenomenon has increased in frequency, but that it doesn't end there: State governors are engaged in the same kind of activity with respect to commutations of sentences and even pardons, and I expressed the hope that Barr might turn his legal eye to these matters as well.
https://cis.org/Cadman/Gubernatorial-Pardons-Defeat-Deportation-vs-State-Take-Care-RequirementsIt is a long-established principle that chief executives — presidents and governors — have the unfettered power to pardon. This sometimes leads to scurrilous exercises of that power, such as when President Bill Clinton pardoned fugitive financier Marc Rich in the hours just before he departed the White House.
