You Can Bet Who President Trump Will Pardon in 2020 – Roger Stone, Paul Manafort and More
- Roger Stone was found guilty of his crimes last week and has been sentenced to 40 months in prison
- Paul Manafort is currently serving time for his crimes, which add up to 7.5 years
- Will President Donald Trump decide to pardon his former associates in 2020?
The topic of presidential pardons has come up quite frequently of late. Last week, President Donald Trump commuted the sentence of a number of people and his former associate Roger Stone was found guilty in a trial.
That’s opened up the conversation as to whether Trump might pardon Stone, Paul Manafort or others.
Will Trump be handing out any pardons to his former associates? Sportsbooks have posted odds on the topic, so let’s take a closer look.
2020 Presidential Pardon Odds
| Potential Persons Pardoned by Trump | Odds |
|---|---|
| Roger Stone | -225 |
| Paul Manafort | +185 |
| Michael Flynn | +250 |
| Martha Stewart | +275 |
| Suge Knight | +450 |
| Rudy Giuliani | +550 |
| Brendan Dassey | +1000 |
| Phil Spector | +1200 |
Odds updated Feb. 24nd
Stone Found Guilty on All Seven Counts
There has been some well-publicized drama in the Roger Stone case as four of the lead prosecutors quit after the Department of Justice disagreed with their decision to push for a seven-to-nine-year sentence for Stone.
He was found guilty on all of seven counts, which included lying to Congress, witness tampering and obstruction of justice.
Attorney General Bill Barr came out and said that the punishment that the prosecutors were seeking was too harsh and as a result, Stone only received 40 months in jail for his crimes. It’s important to note that there is a small possibility of a re-trial and the jury foreperson had previously come out publicly and indicated that she has a clear anti-Trump bias.
Manafort Serving Time for Federal & State Crimes
Paul Manafort was the Chairman of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign but he got entangled in the Robert Mueller probe in ways he could never have imagined. While he never did anything wrong under Trump or for Trump, the probe discovered plenty of crimes he committed previously.
He was found guilty of multiple charges stemming from work with the pro-Russian government of Viktor Yanukovych in Ukraine back in 2014. He was then also busted for witness tampering and obstruction of justice. While those are the federal crimes, there’s more to Manafort’s story.
Manafort was also indicted in the state of New York for 16 charges related to mortgage fraud. That’s relevant because a presidential pardon cannot cover state charges. However, on December 18th, a New York County Supreme Court dismissed those charges. That has opened the door for a Manafort pardon.
Who Is Likely to Get Pardoned?
Manafort is serving a lot of time as he had 43 months stacked on top of 47 for his other crimes. That comes up to seven and a half years. However, I wouldn’t be surprised if both he and Stone get full pardons.
How I see it playing out is this: if Trump loses the election, he’ll have between early November and the end of the year to tie up some loose ends. That probably means he’ll hand out pardons to whoever he wants to save like Manafort, Stone and others. It won’t cost him anything politically at that point.
At the same time, if Trump wins the election, he’ll have four more years to do whatever he wants and he’ll probably be emboldened by that. As soon as the election is over, he’ll have winds at his back and it’ll be the perfect time to pardon whoever he wants because he’ll again be unaffected politically by the decisions.
Stone is who I’d bet on first and I would expect the pardon to come in the fall of 2020.
For over 15 years, Dave has been working in mainstream media and sports betting. He hosted a station on Sirius Satellite Radio for four years, and is currently a senior writer for AskMen. He's interviewed hundreds of hundreds of high-profile sports stars like Shaquille O'Neal and Floyd Mayweather.
