Amy McGrath

I don't know if you are, but the reason I've never been a fan of this idea that the president can pardon, which, you know, it is true.

Yeah.

I just never heard an argument that convinced me that the United States of America really needs to have the president be able to pardon anyone he or she wants.

And honestly, if we got rid of the presidential pardon tomorrow, I think we'd be better off as a democracy, right?

But it's never, Nicole, been very high on my list of changes to our democracy because it's just never been something that...

was super heinously abused in the way that it is being abused now.

And so now there's a push to reform it.

There's a group of lawmakers in Congress who are actually trying to do something.

And they're trying to institute a constitutional amendment that would give Congress the power to block presidential pardons.

So thoughts on that?

I respect that.

I actually think it doesn't go far enough.

I would be for it, but I'd love to get rid of the pardon altogether.

I mean, I think the pardon power has been abused by presidents.

It's been abused by both parties.

Alexander Hamilton wrote it into the Constitution, but both parties have abused it, you know, for...

Ford pardoned Nixon after Watergate.

George W. Bush pardoned folks after Iran-Contra.

We saw President Biden pardon members of his family in advance after he was worried that the Trump administration would have these politically motivated prosecutions against his family.

So, I mean, it's there.