Two men have received commutations of sentence today. Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean.
Bush's act of clemency on Monday for Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean was a victory for Democratic and Republican members of Congress and others who pleaded with the president to pardon the men or at least commute their sentences.However, expect that several more will be announced in coming hours as he leaves office.
Ramos and Compean are each serving sentences of more than 10 years for shooting an unarmed illegal immigrant as he was fleeing an abandoned marijuana load in 2005, then trying to cover it up.
This list isn't particularly useful since I doubt any of those on the list would be pardoned. There is little reason to commute or pardon criminals such as Randy Cunningham, Ted Stevens or other Republicans. Bush has little to gain by issuing pardons to those men whose criminal conduct helped sweep Democrats to power with claims that the GOP was part and parcel of a culture of corruption. Never mind that there's plenty of Democrats who fit the bill, but the smear stuck.
Don't count on former Illinois Governor George Ryan getting pardoned either, despite Democrats lobbying on his behalf.
The same goes for the traitor Jonathan Pollard.
Wonkette has a satirical laundry list of possibilities, which happen to largely match the more legitimate lists above.
UPDATE 1/20/2009:
No more pardons or commutations of sentences. There will be no reprieves for Scooter Libby, Ryan, Pollard, or anyone else associated with the Bush Administration. This is fully in keeping with Bush's view on the pardon power. He certainly wasn't going to use it on individuals who hadn't even been indicted for a crime, which means all the chatter about how Bush would pardon anyone involved in interrogations of terrorists or other unpopular policy decisions was just so much useless blather.
Compean and Ramos are the last two men to have their sentences commuted.
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