To the editor:<\/p>\n
Presidential pardons are intended to correct injustices. Trump\u2019s pardons are used to reward political allies and wealthy donors.<\/p>\n
A few examples: On his first day in office, Trump pardoned roughly 1,500 people charged in connection with the Jan. 6 Capitol attack, including some convicted of assaults on law enforcement.\u00a0He then commuted the sentence of former nursing home executive Philip Esformes, who had been serving a 20-year sentence for bilking $1 billion from Medicare and Medicaid.\u00a0Trump also pardoned Binance founder Changpeng Zhao after a Trump-backed crypto venture became involved in a $2 billion Binance-related investment. <\/p>\n
These pardons share a troubling pattern: People with money, political connections, or loyalty to Trump receive clemency rather than ordinary Americans seeking justice.<\/p>\n
Florida U.S. Senators (Scott and Moody) support the $1.6 billion Slush Fund called the Anti-Weaponization Fund. Floridians should ask why our senators continue to support policies that enable this culture of political favoritism.\u00a0 State and local officials continue to support Trump\u2019s Corruption by naming an airport and roads in Trump\u2019s name.\u00a0<\/p>\n
While Washington politicians hand out pardons to fraudsters and special treatment to wealthy insiders, Lee County families struggle with rising insurance costs, housing costs, and school funding challenges. Corruption at the top always has consequences at home. When political allies, wealthy insiders, and convicted fraudsters receive special treatment, ordinary taxpayers pick up the bill. Floridians should demand leaders who believe public office is a public trust, not a tool for rewarding friends and donors.<\/p>\n
Ray Allen<\/p>\n
Fort Myers<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"To the editor: Presidential pardons are intended to correct injustices. Trump\u2019s pardons are used to reward political allies…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":120266,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[209,211,210],"class_list":["post-320226","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cape-coral","tag-cape-coral","tag-cape-coral-headlines","tag-cape-coral-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320226","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=320226"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320226\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/120266"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=320226"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=320226"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=320226"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}