Trump’s Pardon Attorney Ed Martin Leaves the Justice Department to Fight "Legal Battles" for the Midterms — the Same Day House Judiciary Democrats Report That the Clemency Operation He Ran Erased $1.7 Billion Owed to Crime Victims

August 22, 2026

On Friday, August 21, 2026, President Trump announced on Truth Social that Ed Martin — his U.S. pardon attorney, former head of the Justice Department's "Weaponization Working Group," and former interim U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia — is leaving the administration to work on election litigation for the November midterms and the 2028 presidential race. Attorney General Todd Blanche called Martin a "patriot who loves this nation"; Martin posted "Proud to serve. Fight Fight Fight." Martin had been one of the most contested figures in the second Trump Justice Department. He replaced career pardon attorney Liz Oyer, who was fired in 2025 and said the office had been politicized. He was named a special attorney on mortgage-fraud investigations into Sen. Adam Schiff and New York Attorney General Letitia James — sending James a letter urging her to resign "as an act of good faith" and posing for photographs outside her Brooklyn home — and the case against James was later dismissed when a judge found the prosecutor who brought it had been illegally appointed. Martin was removed as head of the Weaponization Working Group earlier in 2026 while keeping the pardon attorney title. The same day, Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, released a 25-page committee staff report titled "Pardons, Inc.: How Trump and His Clemency-for-Cash Racket Let White-Collar Criminals and International Drug Dealers Walk Free and Dodge Billions in Restitution Owed to Their Victims." The report finds that Trump's clemency grants have wiped out nearly $1.7 billion in restitution, fines and forfeitures owed to victims and taxpayers — up from the committee Democrats' $1.3 billion estimate a year earlier — and argues the White House replaced the DOJ's traditional review criteria with a pay-to-play process running on political contributions, Trump family business ties and MAGA-connected intermediaries. Cases cataloged in the report include Nikola founder Trevor Milton, pardoned after $1.8 million in donations to Trump-aligned committees and released from roughly $700 million in restitution; health care executive Paul Walczak, pardoned weeks after his mother attended a $1 million Mar-a-Lago fundraiser, escaping $4.5 million in stolen payroll taxes; Jason Galanis, who avoided some $84 million in restitution after testifying for Republicans during impeachment proceedings; and Ozy Media's Carlos Watson, whose $37 million in victim restitution was forgiven. The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the report.