Former Connecticut Governor John Rowland, Connecticut publications are reporting, has been pardoned by President Donald Trump.
The Trump pardon differs in important respects from a slew of pardons issued by former
President Joe Biden at the end of his aborted presidential campaign. Biden
issued his pardons before he was forced off the presidential ticket by disgruntled
Democrat leaders such as U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and, Republicans
suspect, former President Barrack Obama.
Rowland was indicted and convicted twice, CTMirror has reported. The governor
resigned “July 1, 2004 at nearly the midpoint of his third term. He pleaded
guilty to a corruption charge on Dec. 23, 2004. Three months later, he was
sentenced to a year and a day in prison, ultimately serving 10 months… He was
indicted a second time in 2014, accused of soliciting congressional candidates
in 2010 and 2012 to secretly pay him as a consultant in campaigns for his old
5th Congressional District seat in violation of campaign finance laws. He was
convicted and sentenced to 30 months in prison.”
The Rowland pardon occurred after he had been convicted in
both cases and sentenced to a combined total of 40 months in prison, all of
which he served. Some important Biden political pardons were prospective. Pardons were issued by Biden – or Biden’s
autopen -- on the chance that Trump, thumped in the media repeatedly as a
vindictive fascist, might, should he be reelected to a second term in office, prosecute
inoffensive political opponents.
The use of the auto pen is particularly questionable in view
of Biden’s cognitive incapacity. Investigations are underway to determine who
the Democrat Svengalis were who may have wielded an authority belonging by law
only to the president. Republicans are now in the process of issuing subpoenas
to Biden’s staffers. "We believe
these are the staffers that were responsible for using the autopen... We want
to ask them, ‘Who gave you the authority to use Joe Biden’s signature?’"
said House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer on “Hannity.”
On January 19, 2025, Biden issued prospective pardons to “The Members of Congress
who served on the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the
United States Capitol (“Select Committee”); the staff of the Select Committee,
as provided by House Resolution 503 (117th Congress); and the police officers
from the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department or the U.S. Capitol Police who
testified before the Select Committee -- For any offenses against the United
States which they may have committed or taken part in arising from or in any
manner related to the activities or subject matter of the Select Committee to
Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol.”
Newsweek reported in January 2025
that Biden had “granted pardons to Dr. Anthony Fauci, retired General Mark
Milley, and members of Congress and staff who served on the January 6 Select
Committee, including arch-critic Liz Cheney. The sweeping clemency also extends
to police officers who testified before the committee investigating the 2021
Capitol attack.”
President Biden apparently drew a red line on a prospective
pardon of his wayward son, Hunter Biden. He vowed not to pardon his wayward son
while a presidential campaign was in progress, later issuing a pardon in 2024. Shamelessness, most American would agree, does
have its limits.
Condemnations of the Rowland pardon by active Democrat
politicians of note were pro-forma
and less than robust, perhaps from fear their opponents might retort that those
who live in glass houses should be wary of throwing stones. Bridgeport
politicians were unusually reticent. The present mayor of Bridgeport is Joe
Ganim, “elected mayor of the city six times, serving from 1991 to 2003, when he
resigned after being convicted on federal felony corruption charges. Ganim was
charged on 16 federal counts: one count each of racketeering, extortion,
racketeering conspiracy, and bribery; two counts of bribery conspiracy; eight
counts of mail fraud, and two counts of filing a false tax return. Released
after having served 7 years in prison, Ganim was reelected Mayor of Bridgeport
in 2015 by a sizable margin after having offered an apology for his past
felonious behavior as mayor.
The western world derives much of its operative notions of
justice from Aristotle, who regarded justice as the prince of virtues.
The essence of justice lies, Aristotle thought, in treating things that are
similar in a similar manner and things that are different in a different
manner: “Thus it is thought that justice is equality; and so it is, but not for
all persons, only for those that are equal. Inequality also is thought to be
just; and so it is, but not for all, only for the unequal. We make a bad
mistake if we neglect this when we are deciding what is just.”
Because Connecticut politics is dominated by Democrats, it
is highly unlikely – just or not – that Rowland any time soon will retrace
Ganim’s easily trod mayoral path to Connecticut’s governorship.
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