President Donald Trump is privately weighing clemency for Sean “Diddy” Combs while Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) remains shut out. The SBF pardon application sits untouched even as Trump signed six emissions-related pardons on Friday.
Sources say a Friday White House meeting focused on Clean Air Act cases only. High-profile requests remain under private discussion.
Diddy Clemency Talks Reach the Oval Office
Sources told CBS News that Trump has been privately discussing clemency requests, including one from Combs. The music mogul is serving just over four years at Fort Dix after his 2025 conviction on two prostitution-related transportation counts.
Jurors acquitted him of sex trafficking and racketeering conspiracy. Trump told the Times in January that Combs had written him a letter seeking a pardon, though he said he was not considering it then.
However, Combs was not expected on the pardons team’s Friday list. Reports in May said Trump was weighing 250 pardons to mark America’s 250th birthday.
Friday’s signings deepen an established pattern instead. Trump pardoned Wyoming mechanic Troy Lake last year over similar emissions charges, and a June 29 executive order told the EPA to deprioritize tampering enforcement.
Trump confirmed the new pardons in a Friday post on Truth Social.
“It is my Great Honor to have just signed Pardons for six people who were persecuted by the Biden Administration, and were in, or being sent to, prison, for ‘fixing their car.’ … I AM SETTING THEM ALL FREE, RIGHT NOW!”
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Where Does the SBF Pardon Stand?
The FTX founder filed a formal pardon application with the Justice Department on June 8, requesting relief after completing his 25-year sentence. The petition remains pending.
Trump has shown no movement on it. In the same January interview, he said he had no intention of pardoning Bankman-Fried. A federal appeals court then crushed his retrial bid in June, leaving the sentence intact.
The contrast with Changpeng Zhao (CZ) is instructive. Trump granted the Binance founder a full pardon on October 21, 2025. CZ had served four months for an anti-money laundering compliance failure, while Binance paid $4.3 billion to settle.
SBF’s case reads differently in Washington. Prosecutors put the FTX fraud at $8 billion, and Senators Cynthia Lummis and Ruben Gallego introduced a resolution opposing any pardon.
Even strong recoveries have not softened that stance. The FTX Recovery Trust has returned roughly $10 billion, with smaller claims recovering up to 120% of 2022 values.
Meanwhile, his market takes from prison revived pardon chatter this week without changing his legal position.
The pattern suggests a firm line in Trump’s clemency thinking. Convictions he frames as regulatory overreach win relief quickly, while large-scale customer fraud stays frozen.
Whether the July Fourth window produces additional names could show how far that distinction stretches.
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