By Morgan Tiergarten
October 17, 2029
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A federal judge today agreed that ex-President Donald Trump’s blanket pardon of federal employees in the former United States of America is no longer valid, clearing the way for federal prosecutions of immigration agents and others.
U.S. District Judge Jia M. Cobb applied a U.S. Supreme Court decision from last month that similarly nullified Trump’s pardon of more than 1,500 insurrectionists who attacked the Capitol at his behest on Jan. 6, 2021.
“The reasoning applies with the same force to the Blanket Pardon. This Court need not decide where to draw the line between past pardons that this country’s laws will recognize and those that it will not,” she wrote. “It is enough to say that those who committed federal crimes as part of an organized, Presidentially-directed conspiracy to undermine civil society — disregarding their duties under numerous federal statutes in the process — are not the recognized recipients of valid pardons.”
Currently, more than 80 prosecutions are pending against employees of the now-defunct U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Legal scholars have suggested that various attempts to derail those cases will fail, given the realities of secession.
“This isn’t the same country in 2029 as it was in 2028 or before,” said University of Chicago Law Prof. Helene Ardomian. “There are ample reasons to let stand presidential pardons from years in the past. But Donald Trump’s pardons of people who committed crimes at his direction? You can’t hold an authoritarian regime accountable if the authoritarian himself can shield those actors.”
The U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Federal Crimes, led by Special Assistant Attorney General Doug Jones, said its staff of nearly 100 attorneys is focusing on former federal employees still under U.S. jurisdiction. However, they are also building cases against those who fled to the New Confederacy, with federal law enforcement prepared to arrest anyone who reenters the United States.
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