President Donald Trump pardoned former New York City Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik and commuted the sentence of former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich on Tuesday afternoon.
Kerik was hailed as a hero for leading the NYPD during the 9/11 attacks, and was later nominated to be the nation's homeland security chief.
He pleaded guilty in 2009 to charges of felony tax fraud and lying to the government and was sentenced the following year o four years in prison. He was released from federal prison in 2013.
President Donald Trump is expected to commute the 14-year prison sentence of former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who was convicted of political corruption just months after he appeared on Trump’s reality TV show, “Celebrity Apprentice."
Blagojevich, who hails from a state with a long history of pay-to-play schemes, is expected to walk out of prison later Tuesday, according to a person close to him, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they had not seen any signed paperwork. He had been found guilty of crimes that included seeking to sell an appointment to Barack Obama's old Senate seat and trying to shake down a children's hospital.
Kerik's pardon was announced just hours after Trump signed an executive order granting a full pardon to former San Francisco 49ers owner Eddie DeBartolo Jr.
on a corruption charge.
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