Trump pardons Meadows, Powell in 2020 election-interference case
President Donald Trump has granted pardons to 77 people who were accused of trying to overturn the 2020 election, including North Carolinians Mark Meadows and Sidney Powell.
US pardon attorney Ed Martin made the announcement on X Sunday night.
Breaking: President Trump pardoned the 2020 Alternative Electors.
— Ed Martin (@EdMartinDOJ) November 10, 2025
Thank you: @POTUS for allowing me, as U.S. Pardon Attorney, to work with @WhiteHouse, along with @AGPamBondi, @DAGToddBlanche & SG John Sauer, to achieve your intent—let their healing begin. #Federalist74 ⚖️ pic.twitter.com/rDOtgpapCB
Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, Kenneth Chesebro, John Eastman, Christina Bobb, and Boris Epshteyn were also among those on the list.
Those given a “full, complete and unconditional” pardon were allegedly involved in a scheme to organize alternate “fake” electors from battleground states that former President Joe Biden won, including Georgia, Arizona, Nevada, Wisconsin, and Michigan.
Meadows served as Trump’s chief of staff during Trump’s first term from March 2020 to January 2021 and is a former US House member for NC-11. He lived in western North Carolina and reportedly now lives on Lake Keowee, South Carolina.
Durham native Powell is a graduate of UNC School of Law. She served as an attorney for Trump during his first term in office.
They were among the 18 people indicted by the state of Georgia in August 2023, along with Trump, for alleged crimes committed during the state’s 2020 elections.
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis claimed that the former president led a “criminal enterprise” to alter the results of the 2020 election.
The proclamation, which the president signed on Friday, begins by stating, “This proclamation ends a grave national injustice perpetrated upon the American people following the 2020 Presidential Election and continues the process of national reconciliation.”
He said the pardons are granted “to all United States citizens for conduct relating to the advice, creation, organization, execution, submission, support, voting, activities, participation in, or advocacy for or of any slate or proposed slate of Presidential electors, whether or not recognized by any State or State official, in connection with the 2020 Presidential Election, as well for any conduct relating to their efforts to expose voting fraud and vulnerabilities in the 2020 Presidential Election.”
The proclamation also notes that it does not pardon Trump himself.
“This pardon does not apply to the President of the United States, Donald J. Trump.”
None of the 77 people were charged at the federal level, so the pardons are considered symbolic, but they could prevent future administrations from prosecuting the alleged co-conspirators.
The alleged “fake electors” plot led to the storming of the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, by Trump’s supporters, with Trump pardoning over 1,000 of them as well.
“Trump pardons Meadows, Powell in 2020 election-interference case” was originally published on www.carolinajournal.com.
