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GOP Sen. Ben Sasse on Trump pardons: "Rotten to the core"

Sen. Ben Sasse during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in October 14. Photo: Hilary Swift-Pool/Getty Images

Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.) issued a terse statement criticizing President Trump for issuing full pardons to 26 more people on Wednesday night, saying: "This is rotten to the core."

Of note: His office set up Sasse's one-line comment by stating that Trump had pardoned "another tranche of felons," specifically naming former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and the president's longtime associate Roger Stone, both of whom the statement said "flagrantly and repeatedly violated the law and harmed Americans."

The big picture: Sasse was endorsed by Trump in 2019.

Editor's note: This article has been updated with more context on Sasse and Trump.

Go deeper

Jonathan Swan, Zachary Basu
Jan 17, 2021 - Politics & Policy
Off the Rails

Episode 3: Descent into madness ... Trump: "Sometimes you need a little crazy"

Photo illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios. Photos: Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Beginning on election night 2020 and continuing through his final days in office, Donald Trump unraveled and dragged America with him, to the point that his followers sacked the U.S. Capitol with two weeks left in his term. This Axios series takes you inside the collapse of a president.

Episode 3: The conspiracy goes too far. Trump's outside lawyers plot to seize voting machines and spin theories about communists, spies and computer software.

President Trump was sitting in the Oval Office one day in late November when a call came in from lawyer Sidney Powell. "Ugh, Sidney," he told the staff in the room before he picked up. "She's getting a little crazy, isn't she? She's really gotta tone it down. No one believes this stuff. It's just too much."

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Jonathan Swan, Zachary Basu
Jan 21, 2021 - Politics & Policy
Off the Rails

Episode 8: The siege

Photo illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios. Photos: Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images

Beginning on election night 2020 and continuing through his final days in office, Donald Trump unraveled and dragged America with him, to the point that his followers sacked the U.S. Capitol with two weeks left in his term. Axios takes you inside the collapse of a president with a special series.

Episode 8: The siege. An inside account of the deadly insurrection at the Capitol on Jan. 6 that ultimately failed to block the certification of the Electoral College. And, finally, Trump's concession.

On Jan. 6, White House deputy national security adviser Matt Pottinger entered the West Wing in the mid-afternoon, shortly after his colleagues' phones had lit up with an emergency curfew alert from D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser.

Go deeper (11 min. read)Arrow
Jonathan Swan, Zachary Basu
Jan 19, 2021 - Politics & Policy
Off the Rails

Episode 6: Last stand in Georgia

Photo illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios. Photo: Drew Angerer, Raymond Boyd/Getty Images

Beginning on election night 2020 and continuing through his final days in office, Donald Trump unraveled and dragged America with him, to the point that his followers sacked the U.S. Capitol with two weeks left in his term. Axios takes you inside the collapse of a president with a special series.

Episode 6: Georgia had not backed a Democratic presidential candidate since 1992 and Donald Trump's defeat in this Deep South stronghold, and his reaction to that loss, would help cost Republicans the U.S. Senate as well. Georgia was Trump's last stand.

On Air Force One, President Trump was in a mood. He had been clear he did not want to return to Georgia, and yet somehow he'd been conscripted into another rally on the night of Jan. 4.

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