Hannity Has New Advice for Trump

Fox host uses radio, TV shows to advise president to pardon himself
By John Johnson,  Newser Staff
Posted Dec 1, 2020 7:14 AM CST
Hannity Has New Advice for Trump
President Trump speaks with reporters after participating in a video teleconference call with members of the military on Thanksgiving at the White House.   (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)

Sean Hannity is making his advice to President Trump loud and clear: Pardon yourself. The Fox News host used both his TV show and his radio show Monday to spread the message, reports Business Insider. "The president out the door needs to pardon his whole family and himself," Hannity said on his radio show. "I assume that the power of the pardon is absolute, and that he should be able to pardon anybody that he wants to." That's actually a matter of constitutional debate, as guest Sidney Powell—an attorney recently ousted from Trump's legal team on the election—pointed out. "It is absolute, it's in the Constitution but I don't know about the ability to pardon himself," she said. On his TV show later Monday, Hannity made the same suggestion while talking to Newt Gingrich.

The Fox host said Democrats would go after Trump legally and cited a recent op-ed by Andrew Weissman, a former prosecutor on Robert Mueller's team, as proof. “If that’s what they want to do—if Biden becomes president—I’d tell President Trump to pardon yourself and pardon your family,” said Hannity. “They want this witch hunt to go on in perpetuity,” he added of Democrats in his conversation with Powell. “They’re so full of rage and insanity against the president.” Trump himself has not said recently whether he is weighing such an option, but the Washington Post notes that he retweeted a post from GOP Rep. Matt Gaetz last month after Gaetz suggested a self-pardon. Trump also asserted in 2018 that he had the "absolute right" to do so. (The constitutional debate may hinge on the interpretation of a single word.)

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