Why These Trump Enemies Say They WON'T Beg For Biden Pardons

Donald Trump’s “enemies” are collectively freaking out as Inauguration Day draws near, with the incoming president’s strong arm of the law in hot pursuit.

Some are seeking get-out-of-jail-free cards from President Joe Biden in his twilight hours, but others worry seeking preemptive pardons may send a dangerous message.

“I’ve done nothing wrong,” former Trump White House intelligence official Olivia Troye told the Daily Beast.

Troye, who served as national security adviser to Trump’s vice president, Mike Pence, is a target—specifically of Kash Patel, Trump’s conspiracy-minded choice to head the FBI. While Patel didn’t name her in his lengthy hit list in a book he wrote last year, he still threatened to sue her last week.

(Troye and Patel were national security colleagues at the White House.)

Those who have made Patel’s list include Hillary Clinton, outgoing FBI Director Christopher Wray and Attorney General Merrick Garland. But notable Republicans, including former Trump officials, also made the cut—Trump national security adviser John Bolton (who wrote this week that senators “won’t escape history’s judgment if they vote to confirm” Patel as FBI director) as well as former Defense Secretary Mark Esper (who has also raised concerns about Patel’s nomination) and former Trump Justice Department communications director Sarah Isgur, who explained Friday in The New York Times why she doesn’t want a pardon.

“I can’t speak for anyone else on the list, but I would hope that none of them would want a pardon, either. If we broke the law, we should be charged and convicted,” she wrote. “If we didn’t break the law, we should be willing to show that we trust the fairness of the justice system that so many of us have defended. And we shouldn’t give permission to future presidents to pardon political allies who may commit real crimes on their behalf.”

Troye isn’t seeking a pardon either. But she says innocence hardly matters to the MAGA loyalists who’ve vowed to exact revenge on officials like her in Trump’s first term who dared to speak truth to power.

“That doesn’t mean they’re not going to do everything they can to harass me and so many others these next few years in whatever way possible,” Troye said. Those “others” include her own pro bono attorney, the prominent national security lawyer Mark Zaid, who shares her view.

“I haven’t asked for a pardon nor plan to do so,” Zaid told the Daily Beast, “but I also don’t have the complete faith that the system will protect people. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

Zaid recently sent a scathing, if entertaining, letter to Patel’s attorneys after they threatened Troye with a defamation lawsuit demanding that she retract comments she made about Patel on MSNBC.

“I respectfully note that many—if not all—of her statements have been previously or similarly stated by a wide swarth of the knowledgeable population,” Zaid noted.

He ended his letter to Patel’s lawyers by invoking Monty Python.

Patel is known for pushing far-right conspiracy theories, including the unhinged QAnon movement—which claims among other things that the Satanic-worshiping “deep state” and liberal politicians do unspeakable things to children—and the “Russia hoax.” QAnon has inspired violence worldwide, and the FBI in 2019 declared the group a domestic terrorism threat.

Patel had worked on the Devin Nunes memo, the eponymous document by House Intelligence Committee Republicans who snooped on their own government’s spies, mainly within their own party.

Patel warned last year on MAGA firebrand Steve Bannon’s podcast that if Trump won the 2024 presidential election, “We will go out and find the conspirators—not just in government, but in the media.”

He added: “We’re going to come after you, whether it’s criminally or civilly, we’ll figure that out.”

As FBI director, Patel would have sweeping authority to investigate groups and individuals he deems to be of concern.

As a lawyer representing several high-profile Trump enemies, Zaid is all too familiar with the threats becoming real. And while he doesn’t believe he or his clients should ask for pardons, he thinks those at the highest levels of government and military who Trump has threatened may want to take an extended vacation abroad ahead of the inauguration on Jan. 20.

“If it was Mark Milley, I’m not sure I’d want to be around,” Zaid said, referring to the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff who fears a vindictive court-martialing after calling Trump a “total fascist” and the “most dangerous person to this country.” (Milley is also on Patel’s hit list.)

“They have made it clear they want to act swiftly and decisively,” Zaid told the Beast.