Trump pardons 11 people on eve of country’s Fourth of July celebrations

Pardons issued to nine people charged with violating Clean Air Act as extreme heat smothers much of US

Donald Trump on Friday issued pardons to 11 men – two convicted fraudsters and nine charged with having violated the federal Clean Air Act by disabling or otherwise modifying trucks’ emissions controls.

Those executive pardons – coming amid US semiquincentennial celebrations blanketed in extreme heat exacerbated by greenhouse gas emissions – were among a broader wave of acts of clemency from Trump during his second presidency, chiefly for those he considers to be aligned with him.

Among the pardon recipients was Adam Kidan, the president of a light industrial staffing company who had been sentenced to nearly six years in prison in 2006 in connection with the purchase of a fleet of gambling boats.

Kidan was a former business partner of Washington DC lobbyist Jack Abramoff. And the case that sent Kidan to prison was part of wider investigation into an early 2000s lobbying scandal centering on Abramoff, Capitol Hill, the US Department of the Interior and some members of George W Bush’s presidential administration.

Newsday reported in March that Kidan helped host a fundraiser at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club in Florida for a Republican congressional candidate from New York’s Long Island.

Meanwhile, another pardon recipient was Jack Harvard, who legal filings show was convicted of bank fraud charges in the 1980s. Trump cited Harvard’s “upstanding” post-conviction record and his allowing troops from the US as well as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (Nato) to train on his ranch for free.

The other nine who were pardoned on Friday had been faced with Clean Air Act violations under the Biden administration between Trump’s nonconsecutive White House terms. Citing a Trump administration official, CBS News identified them as Ryan Lalone, Wade Lalone, Matt Geouge, Tim Clancy, Mac Spurlock, Joshua Davis, Barry Pierce and Aaron Rudolf.

Trump posted on his Truth Social platform about some of those nine, arguing that – as he saw it – they were “in, or being sent to, prison for ‘fixing their car’”.

“I AM SETTING THEM ALL FREE, RIGHT NOW!” Trump added.

The Clean Air Act-related pardons came within days of Trump having signed a memo to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) asserting that people in the US could fix their vehicles however they wanted.

Trump in signing that memo made reference to a diesel mechanic he pardoned in November, Troy Lake, who disabled emissions-monitoring systems.

The Trump administration in February separately repealed a scientific finding that greenhouse gas ‌emissions endanger human health. And it eliminated federal tailpipe emissions standards ​for cars and trucks.

Blistering heat gripping much of the US during celebrations of the 250th anniversary of the nation’s Declaration of Independence would have been “virtually impossible” if not for the ongoing global climate crisis, according to Worldwide Weather Attribution researchers. Greenhouse gas emissions are primarily driving that crisis, scientists have found.

Meanwhile, organizers of an Independence Day parade planned for Saturday in Washington DC as part of Trump’s Freedom 250 initiative abruptly canceled the event late on the eve of the event, citing an extreme heat warning issued by the National Weather Service.

And on Friday, Freedom 250’s Great American State Fair on the National Mall temporarily closed down after reports that more than 40 visitors had been treated for heat-related illness. The heat also delayed the opening of the fair on Saturday.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed reporting