NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Tennessee Republican Gov. Bill Lee on Friday announced he is pardoning 43 people who have served out their sentences, stressing that his actions are “very different” than President Joe Biden’s recent wave of commutations.
Lee’s latest clemency moves are nearly double his next highest total for a single year.
But this time around, Lee specifically noted that he chose not to shorten any sentences — known as commutations — in his yearly announcement of clemency actions around Christmas. He aimed to distance his approach from Biden’s, saying the people he pardoned in Tennessee have finished their sentences and rejoined their communities, and each had a recommendation from the state Board of Parole. Lee has issued seven commutations since taking office in 2019.
Last week, Biden commuted the sentences of roughly 1,500 people who were released from prison and placed on home confinement during the coronavirus pandemic and pardoned 39 Americans convicted of nonviolent crimes, marking the largest single-day act of clemency in modern history. Some of the clemency actions drew community backlash. The clemency push followed a broad pardon for the Democrat’s son Hunter, who has been convicted of federal felony gun and tax crimes.
“These are very different individuals than many of the individuals whose sentences were commuted in the previous federal clemency grant,” Lee told reporters.
In Tennessee, a pardon serves as a statement of forgiveness to someone who has completed their prison sentence and are no longer incarcerated, while commutation shortens a sentence but lets the conviction stand. Lee has only issued one exoneration while in office, in which the governor declares that the applicant didn’t commit the crime. Other governors are likewise issuing acts of clemency around the holidays.
President-elect Donald Trump, whom Lee supports, has drawn scrutiny for clemency actions as well — helping a slate of well-connected people in his first term, and promising to start his next administration with pardons for people who were arrested for their role in the riot at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
The governor’s office said none of the people he pardoned Friday have had an active criminal sentence for at least five years, including probation or parole.
“They’ve been out, but they’ve also shown a compelling reason and interest for getting a pardon and have shown exemplary citizenship,” Lee said.
Lee highlighted several cases, including that of Lanesha Faye Brown. Lee said Brown was convicted of attempted second-degree murder in 1998 at 13 years old after she had been bullied at school and, in one circumstance, tried to retaliate with a small knife for an art class project when a bully attacked her. He said she now has been married for 15 years, earned an associate’s degree, and has worked at a Nashville hotel. She was once fired because of a background check, but her hotel coworkers and manager rallied to get her rehired, Lee said.
The clemency actions follow an election cycle in which Republicans nationally leaned on tough-on-crime messaging, which has also been a focal point for Tennessee’s Legislature in recent years. Lee, meanwhile, was elected governor in 2018 on a message that included criminal justice reform priorities. He has said clemency decisions and criminal justice reform are unrelated.
Last year, Lee approved 22 pardons and commuted one person’s sentence. He issued 13 pardons and three commutations in 2022, and in 2021 he pardoned 13 people, signed off on three commutations and exonerated one person.
Lee’s predecessor, former Republican Gov. Bill Haslam, granted nine commutations, 35 pardons, and one exoneration over eight years in office.