Crime victims across the country were promised by federal judges that they would be paid back. Then President Donald Trump’s clemency orders made those debts disappear.
A new CBS News investigation found that Trump’s clemency orders have erased at least $119 million in unpaid, court-ordered restitution owed to crime victims since January 2025. By contrast, Department of Justice records show former President Joe Biden’s clemency orders erased about $14,000 over his four years in office, largely because most of his actions were commutations that left financial penalties in place.
What the investigation looked at
CBS News reviewed court judgments in more than 160 clemency orders Trump issued from January 2025 through October 2026, counting restitution that was still unpaid when clemency was granted. The review set aside his more than 1,500 blanket pardons and commutations tied to the 2020 election and the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.
The $119 million is only part of the picture. According to the investigation, another $119.9 million in fines is no longer owed to the federal Crime Victims Fund. About $665.8 million in restitution that prosecutors had requested was cancelled by clemency before a court could rule on it, including the $660.8 million prosecutors sought from former Nikola CEO Trevor Milton before Trump pardoned him. Counting roughly $170.9 million in restitution owed jointly with co-defendants who did not receive clemency, the total affected tops $1.1 billion.
Who lost out
The victims range from small family food businesses and community banks to candy maker Mars Wrigley, the IRS and other federal agencies, actor Terry Crews, and a trust in the name of baseball star Alex Rodriguez.
The largest single sum wiped away was almost $49 million that a judge had ordered siblings Andres and Adriana Camberos to repay 19 companies after their October 2024 conviction in a food-resale scheme. Those companies ranged from Mars Wrigley, owed $22 million, to a small veteran-owned business in Virginia owed $17,800. Trump’s clemency for both siblings in January 2026 erased that debt.
Another case involves Ozy Media founder Carlos Watson, convicted of fraud by a federal jury in Brooklyn in July 2024 and ordered to repay investors almost $37 million. Hours before Watson was due to report to prison in March 2025, Trump commuted his nearly 10-year sentence, and the clemency wiped away the restitution. Investor Thomas Franco, who put almost $4 million into the company, told CBS News he felt victimized all over again. “Clearly the president has constitutional authority to grant clemency, and I certainly don’t question that authority,” he said. “But authority and accountability are two very different things.”
A booming “pardon economy”
CBS News describes the erased debts as a hidden cost of a pardon economy that has grown during Trump’s second term, in which wealthy, well-connected defendants hire lobbyists and lawyers with ties to the president to press their cases directly with the White House. About 70% of Trump’s second-term clemency actions have bypassed the Justice Department’s pardon office, the traditional route, rising to 92% when the January 6 cases are included.
Restitution grew out of the victims’ rights movement of the 1970s, and unlike fines, it goes directly to the people who were harmed. Law professor Mark Osler of the University of St. Thomas, who runs a pro bono clemency clinic, called it “the rare appearance of restorative justice” in the criminal justice system.
A president can grant a conditional pardon that requires restitution to be paid. In case after case, these orders did the opposite, leaving the victims to absorb the loss.