Roger Stone today accused two top House allies of President Trump of privately advocating against Trump's decision to keep him out of prison last week
But Trump opted to keep Stone out of prison altogether, commuting his sentence on July 10, just four days before he was due to report to a Georgia facility. The commutation left Stone's convictions standing, and he has vowed to keep fighting them on appeal, though Trump could always pardon him fully at a later date.
Stone's indication that McCarthy and Stefanik — two of Trump's most prominent House defenders during the Russia investigation and impeachment inquiry — fought against immediate clemency is notable because few elected Republicans have spoken publicly on the matter. Aides to the lawmakers did not respond to requests for comment.
Of those who did speak, Sen. Mitt Romney called it "unprecedented, historic corruption" and Sen. Pat Toomey said he disagreed with the decision. Sen. Lindsey Graham , on the other hand, endorsed Trump's commutation decision, saying it was appropriate because Stone was a first-time nonviolent offender.
Stone was convicted last year on multiple counts of lying to the House Intelligence Committee about his efforts to contact WikiLeaks and gain advanced knowledge of its plans to release hacked emails from Hillary Clinton and her campaign advisers. He was also convicted of threatening a witness in the case and was twice rebuked by the judge in his trial for violating gag orders.
Stone was sentenced in February to 40 months in prison, and his efforts to postpone the start of his jail term failed when Judge Amy Berman Jackson rejected a last-ditch attempt to delay his sentence until September.
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