S. 5212 — No Payoffs for Pardons Act

This section states findings that the Constitution grants the President broad pardon authority to serve justice, that President Trump has transformed the power into a benefit for political donors, loyalists, and well-connected individuals while neglecting the roughly 10,000 ordinary petitioners in the Department of Justice process, that his clemency has eliminated nearly $2,000,000,000 in victim repayments and taxpayer recoveries, that he has undercut federal investigations and granted clemency to narcotraffickers, and that he issued blanket pardons and commutations for roughly 1,600 January 6 offenders while directing the Department of Justice to vacate seditious conspiracy convictions of Proud Boys and Oath Keepers leaders.

This section requires recipients of presidential pardons, commutations, or other executive clemency to file disclosure reports with the Attorney General identifying each covered benefit of $10,000 or more (adjusted for inflation) provided during the disclosure period to the President, an immediate family member, or related entities, including any 501(a) tax-exempt organization, presidential library or foundation, Inaugural Committee, or political committee. Reports must be filed within 90 days after clemency and annually for the following four calendar years, with the Attorney General publishing them on a public website within 30 days; the disclosure period runs from one year before the granting President’s inauguration through the fourth calendar year after clemency.

This section expands the federal bribery statute to cover the President and Vice President as public officials, to treat candidates for federal office as persons subject to the statute with respect to official acts they would perform upon taking office, and to classify pardons, commutations, reprieves, and other executive clemency as official acts and things of value. It also extends the statute of limitations for bribery offenses involving executive clemency to 10 years.