Cnn
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President Donald Trump On Monday, the former Illinois governor forgave on Monday. Rod Blagojevichwho was sent to prison for corruption surrounding his time in power.
Signing forgiveness in the oval office, Trump described Blagojevich as a “very beautiful person” and said it was time to “give him a normal life”.
“It was a kind of terrible injustice,” said Trump. “They were just after him. They go after many people. They are bad people, the other side. »»
Blagojevich, who was a Democrat governor of Illinois from 2003 to 2009, was dismissed from his duties and sentenced later for charges which included a program to sell a appointment to fulfill the vacant seat of the Senate left by the president of ‘era, Barack Obama.
A first trial led to a jury suspended from numerous key accusations against him, but a second led to the 2011 condemnation out of 17 of the 20 corruption accounts.
The former governor served eight years with a sentence of 14 years in prison before Trump switched his sentence during his first term in early 2020. Trump’s decision Faced with the opposition of certain conservative members of the Congress and the White House advisers who warned the president that it would undermine his promise to “drain the marsh”.
Trump at the time described Blagojevich as a “very kind person” and criticized his long prison sentence. The former governor then turned into an ardent defender of Trump who supported his 2020 and 2024 presidential races. Blagojevich told CNN last year that he considered himself a “Trumpocrat”, which he described Like a Democrat who supports Trump.
Blagojevich was also a candidate for Trump’s television program “The Celebrity Apprentice” in 2010, after being moved from his duties but before his first trial.