WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump has pardoned the former Tennessee House speaker and a onetime aide of public corruption charges after the White House said the Biden administration Justice Department “significantly over-prosecuted” both for a minor issue.
Former Republican state Rep. Glen Casada was sentenced in September to three years in prison, and his former chief of staff, Cade Cothren, was also convicted and received a 2 1/2-year prison. The case centered on their actions after both had been driven from their leadership roles and were accused in a scheme to win taxpayer-funded mail business from lawmakers.
The moves continued a pattern of Trump, a Republican, using his second term to bestow unlikely pardons on political allies, prominent public figures and others convicted of defrauding the public.
Many of the clemencies he granted have targeted criminal cases once touted as just by the Justice Department. They also have come amid a continuing Trump administration effort to errode public integrity guardrails — including the firing of the department’s pardon attorney and the near-dismantling of a prosecution unit established to hold public officials accountable for abusing the public trust.
According to prosecutors, Cothren launched a company called Phoenix Solutions — with the knowledge and support of Casada and then-Rep. Robin Smith. The three claimed the company was run by “Matthew Phoenix,” later determined to be fictitious. The companies controlled by Casada and Smith received roughly $52,000 in taxpayer money in 2020 from a mailer program for lawmakers.