If these employees knowingly performed illegal acts, but believed that being close to Musk/Trump meant that they wouldn't face the music, then what kind of law enforcement/justice is there remaining in the U.S.?
It's also galling as it seems to be the opposite of the Nuremberg defense - employees can knowingly do illegal acts as long as their boss/commander wants them to. A complete lack of personal responsibility.
> If these employees knowingly performed illegal acts, but believed that being close to Musk/Trump meant that they wouldn't face the music, then what kind of law enforcement/justice is there remaining in the U.S.?
If Trump actually pardons them, and their crimes were exclusively federal, then none (barring something like a Constitutional amendment invalidating pardons, or providing a mechanism to do so, which seems quite improbable.)
If Trump doesn't pardon them, or any state crimes were committed, then potentially some (though, for federal crimes, unless the Trump Justice Department actively prosecutes them, which seems improbable even in the absence of a pardon, that requires the crime have a sufficiently long statute of limitations to be prosecutable in a subsequent administration, and even if that is in 2029 there is only a short window for most federal crimes, which have a five year statute of limitations, and I would suspect there is going to be a big investigative and prosecutorial backlog to address at that time.)
It's also galling as it seems to be the opposite of the Nuremberg defense - employees can knowingly do illegal acts as long as their boss/commander wants them to. A complete lack of personal responsibility.