Rudy Giuliani said earlier today that it is within the president’s power to pardon himself, but said that he would not do that.
JUST IN: Does Pres. Trump have the power to pardon himself?
— This Week (@ThisWeekABC) June 3, 2018
"He's not, but he probably does," Rudy Giuliani tells @GStephanopoulos. "He has no intention of pardoning himself, but that doesn't say he can't." https://t.co/IEUEWnjQqe #ThisWeek pic.twitter.com/IE1AocigYl
From the Hill:
Rudy Giuliani said early Sunday that President Trump “probably” has the power to pardon himself, but has no plans to do so.
“He’s not, but he probably does,” Giuliani, who recently joined Trump’s legal team, said on ABC’s “This Week.”
“He has no intention of pardoning himself,” Giuliani said.
“That’s another really interesting constitutional question: Can the president pardon himself?” he added.“It would be an open question. I think it would probably get answered by, ‘gosh that’s what the Constitution says.’ And if you want to change it, change it. But, yeah.”
“I think the political ramifications of that would be tough,” Giuliani continued. “Pardoning other people is one thing, pardoning yourself is another.”
There would definitely be political consequences to a president pardoning himself, but the devil is in the details. If he pardons himself on a “process crime” like accidentally lying to the feds in testimony, it doesn’t matter. If he pardons himself because he was caught on tape promising to give Putin all of Ukraine if he leaks Podesta’s emails through Wikileaks, well… that’s a little different isn’t it.