Trump-supporting pundit Wayne Allan Root thinks Trump can afford to spend some political capital on a pardon for an American hero.
Root called on Trump to pardon his friend, former cop, and ex-convict Bernie Kerik. Before serving time in jail for tax fraud and making false statements, Kerik was widely seen as an American hero for overseeing the NYPD’s response to the 9/11 terror attacks in Manhattan.
“If ever there was a perfect candidate for a pardon, it’s Bernie Kerik, American hero. If ever there was a perfect moment to do it, Mr. President, that moment is now. You have the momentum, you have the American people’s support,” Root wrote.
Root calls on Trump to pardon 9/11 hero
Before his imprisonment, Kerik was known as “America’s cop” for his heroic recovery efforts at Ground Zero, which saved thousands of people. The NYPD’s 40th police commissioner was on his way up in 2004, having been nominated by George W. Bush to lead the Department of Homeland Security, when he withdrew his name from consideration, citing his employment of an illegal nanny.
The admission sparked an investigation that led to Kerik’s conviction and imprisonment for four years on charges of making false statements and tax charges related to the nanny, as well as unrelated apartment renovations. In his plea to President Trump, Root cast Kerik as the victim of a rigged justice system, one that Kerik is now working to reform. He wrote:
But my friend Bernie was an enemy of the D.C. Swamp. He was targeted for destruction and his life was ruined. He eventually pleaded guilty to false statements and tax charges that all started with failing to pay payroll taxes to his children’s nanny.
Root briefly recounted Root’s heroic deeds, which came across a thirty-year career in law enforcement. As a New York cop, Root had “saved victims from burning buildings, been shot at, stabbed and survived the largest terrorist attack in U.S. history and a bomb plot aimed at him.” He oversaw a massive police department including 55,000 personnel and a $3.2 billion budget.
Before serving as NYPD commissioner, Kerik oversaw the largest penal system in the country as New York’s Corrections commissioner. Root further noted that Kerik helped found the Twin Towers Fund, which raised and distributed $216 million to the families of first responders killed on 9/11.
Criminal justice reform advocate
Kerik has since become a criminal justice reform advocate. In a 2015 op-ed, he decried “draconian sentences” that were “creating a permanent American underclass of society that is costing the American taxpayers billions of dollars.” President Trump invited Kerik to the White House in December to commemorate the passage of the FIRST STEP act, Trump’s landmark criminal justice reform package.
“As somebody that ran the largest police department in the country, and the largest jail system — Rikers Island — and somebody that spent time at federal prison, I have to tell you, I never believed — I never thought this would happen,” he said at the time.
However, Trump has since soured on FIRST STEP, according to Politico, which quoted a source as saying that Trump is mad at Jared Kushner, his son-in-law and the architect of the legislation. Trump is reportedly “furious at Jared because Jared is telling him he’s going to get all these votes of all these felons.”
Kerik also was on the defense team for acquitted Navy officer Ed Gallagher. Trump had considered pardoning Gallagher before he was found not guilty of war crimes in Iraq.
While Trump may no longer see exactly eye to eye with Kerik on criminal justice reform, there’s a strong case for Trump to pardon this American hero.
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