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I was aware of the allegations that Marc Rich's ex wife gave money to Clinton ($450k to the library) is what led Clinton to pardon, but I never really dug into it.

Per wikipedia, Clinton's defense was that it was actually a favor to Israel, given Rich helping to finance their intel services. Maybe everybody else knew this, I didn't.

I’ve read the same, I can’t see any net benefit here aside from grift.

I mean, in all honesty, if our system is going to allow the grift and one is amoral enough to do so, have at it. It may catch backup later.

Of course they can. Republicans (well MAGA in particular) don't are about hypocracy. They make exceptions for Trump on everything.

I mean, that was one pardon 25 years ago and widely criticized across the political spectrum.

It's hard to count how many purely political and money-based pardons Trump has done this term, and there is essentially no pushback on his side.