To pardon or not to pardon: GOP candidates highlight positions on Trump indictment

Promising a preemptive pardon for former President Donald Trump is wrong, former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, one of Trump’s rivals in the GOP presidential primary, said Sunday.

“It is simply wrong for a candidate to use the pardon power of the United States, of the president, in order to curry votes and in order to get an applause line,” Hutchinson said during an interview on CNN’s "State of the Union."

Vivek Ramaswamy, another GOP presidential hopeful, on Thursday promised to pardon the former president should he be found guilty of the charges federal prosecutors unveiled last week. Earlier on the same Sunday show, Ramaswamy said he had “no faith whatsoever” in the “vague allegations,” detailed in the 49-page indictment.

“If you start down that path, it is unending. And so we shouldn't be promising and holding out the fig leaf of a pardon because that undermines our jury system,” Hutchinson said, calling the idea of offering Trump a pardon before the case is tried “offensive.”

Ramaswamy is not the only candidate who wants a pardon for the former president. Republican businessman Perry Johnson has called on President Joe Biden to pardon Trump, and pledged to do the same if elected.