U.S. President Donald Trump has granted preemptive pardons to former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani and others accused of attempting to overturn the 2020 election results. Ed Martin, a pardon-specialist attorney for the government, published a list of dozens of people to whom Trump has granted a "total, unconditional, and complete" pardon on Sunday night on his X profile. Among them is Giuliani, who rose to fame in the 1980s and 1990s in New York City as a prosecutor before being elected mayor, a position he held for two terms (1994-2001). In recent years, his reputation was tarnished by spreading conspiracy theories about the 2020 election, in which, in his view, Trump, whom he advised during his first term, lost due to fraud in the vote count. Giuliani currently faces state charges in Arizona for election interference, and in 2023 he was found guilty of spreading false information about election workers in Georgia, which resulted in a fine of over 145 million dollars. In addition to Giuliani, the list of pardoned individuals includes Sidney Powell, a Trump lawyer who in 2023 pleaded guilty to attempting to overturn the presidential election results in Georgia, as well as John Eastman, who advised the Republican leader during his 2020 election campaign. Mark Meadows, former White House Chief of Staff for part of Trump's first term, has also received the president's pardon after being accused of pressuring state officials in Georgia to favor the current president. "This proclamation ends a grave national injustice perpetrated against the American people following the 2020 presidential election and continues the process of national reconciliation," the document reads. However, these pardons are preemptive, as they only apply to federal charges, and none of the names on the list have open cases in federal court.
