Former Department of Justice pardon attorney Liz Oyer is warning that President Donald Trump’s aggressive use of clemency power has already produced dangerous consequences, particularly for defendants involved in the January 6 Capitol riot.

In a guest essay for The New York Times, Oyer said that in the opening months of Trump’s second term, the country has already witnessed “alarming cases of recidivism among the Jan. 6 defendants pardoned on Mr. Trump’s first day in office.”

“Some have been charged with or convicted of offenses involving sexual exploitation of children, threats against public officials, and even a plot to kill federal employees. Several clemency recipients from Mr. Trump’s first term in office — when vetting was similarly casual — have also returned to prison.”

Oyer, who served as the DOJ’s pardon attorney from 2022 to 2025, said that's because Trump bypassed the traditional, merit-based review process her office used to vet clemency applicants. On Inauguration Day, Trump issued about 1,500 pardons tied to January 6 without consulting her or her team, even as her office was still expected to facilitate the releases, she wrote Friday in the Times.

“Over the next three days, 27 more pardons were granted, all without even a nod to the traditional role of the Justice Department in advising the president on pardons,” Oyer added. By contrast, Oyer said, prior presidents, including Joe Biden, Bill Clinton, and George H.W. Bush, relied on careful evaluations by the DOJ's pardon attorney, a position she held for nearly three years.

“Ignoring a careful, merit-based review of clemency applicants is a dangerous proposition,” she wrote Friday in the Times. Oyer went on to criticize congressional Republicans, who she said have stood by Trump by choosing “to focus on investigating the pardons issued by his predecessor” instead of “forcefully confronting the corrosive effects of Mr. Trump’s reckless pardoning.”

While Oyer, author of the newsletter Lawyer Oyer, also had tough words for Biden’s late-term pardons, including his pardons of his son, Hunter, and other Biden family members, she argued that Trump’s approach poses a far greater threat to the U.S. justice system.

“Both quantitatively and qualitatively, what Mr. Trump is doing with pardons is far more damaging to the American ideal of delivering justice evenhandedly,” she concluded.

President Donald Trump bragged this week that his endorsement caused sales to skyrocket on a book — but even the author of that book is calling this out as nonsense, The Daily Beast reported on Friday evening.

"Trump boasted at the White House Christmas reception earlier this month that he had boosted sales for Venom and Valor: A White House Physician Assistant’s Battle for Survival in the Amazon, written by his former medical adviser, Dr. James Jones, by promoting it in a Truth Social post," reported Erkki Forster. Jones himself, who wrote the book about a year ago, was reportedly in the audience during this speech.

“It sold about two copies, but it had a hell of a cover,” Trump said. “I put it out: ‘Great book. Bop bop bop,’ picture of this viper, coming like, boom from the White House. And his publisher calls him, said, ‘Doctor, what happened? What’s going on?’… They sold 100,000 books.”

That's not true, Jones told NOTUS.

“I don’t think it’s a massive bump, but, you know, I’m sure it didn’t hurt anything. But I haven’t seen anything that’s excessive,” said Jones, who added that Trump never consulted with him before giving his book a boost — something that, according to NOTUS, has been a running pattern with the authors Trump promotes.

While Jones, who also served under former President Barack Obama, did not write his book explicitly about the president, all of this comes amid data that shows the general public is souring on reading about Trump. Sales of books about the president have plummeted in this term, compared to Trump's first term.

Donald Trump is facing rare pressure from members of his own party who want the president to take a harder stance against Russian President Vladimir Putin as he prepares for an expected meeting Sunday with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, according to a report from The New York Times.

Three Republican senators – John Barrasso (R-WY), Jerry Moran (R-KS), and Thom Tillis (R-NC) – joined five Democrats and one independent in issuing a sharply worded statement Friday describing Putin as a “ruthless murderer” who “has no interest in peace” and “cannot be trusted.”

The statement condemned Russian missile and drone attacks on Ukraine that continued through the Christmas holiday.

While the statement stopped short of offering any direct criticism of the MAGA leader’s handling of negotiations aimed at ending the bloody, yearslong war, its tone was notably tougher than the language Trump has often used about Putin. Trump has urged the Russian leader to end the invasion, but has also repeatedly praised their relationship and said he “gets along well” with him, the Times noted.

“It bears repeating that President Zelensky agreed to a Christmas truce, but Putin declined,” the statement said, “yet he directs soldiers to continue to commit brutal crimes of aggression on one of Christianity’s holiest days.”

The statement was led by Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and was also signed by Sens. Angus King (I-ME), Jacky Rosen (D-NV), Chris Coons (D-DE), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), and Chris Van Hollen (D-MD). Notably absent were most Republican members of the committee, including its chairman, Sen. Jim Risch (R-ID), a close Trump ally, according to the Times report.

Republican strategist Alex Conant told the Times the statement appeared aimed at showing bipartisan support for Zelenskyy, noting GOP senators have “time and time again” shown more skepticism of Putin than Trump.

“He doesn’t have anything until I approve it,” Trump told Politico Friday of Zelenskyy ahead of the meeting. “So we’ll see what he’s got.” The president added that he also expects to speak with Putin “soon, as much as I want.”