Trump pardons MLB great Darryl Strawberry on 1995 tax evasion charge
Former New York Met Darryl Strawberry speaks to the media before a ceremony to retire his jersey number at Citi Field in June 2024.
By Betsy Klein, CNN
(CNN) — President Donald Trump has granted clemency to former Major League Baseball star Darryl Strawberry for a 1995 tax evasion charge.
Trump, a White House official said, “has approved a pardon for Darryl Strawberry, three-time World Series champion and eight-time MLB All-Star.”
“Mr. Strawberry served time and paid back taxes after pleading guilty to one count of tax evasion,” the official added, highlighting his subsequent sobriety, his Christian faith, and his efforts to start a recovery center in Florida.
Strawberry, who played for the New York Yankees, the New York Mets, and other teams during his MLB career, pleaded guilty to tax evasion in 1995, which The New York Times reported at the time avoided a trial on three tax-related counts that could have landed him in prison for fifteen years.
Strawberry thanked Trump in an Instagram post that included several pictures of the two men and recounted learning about the clemency plan in a phone call with the president on Thursday.
“President Trump spoke warmly about my baseball days in NYC, praising me as one the greatest player of the ‘80s and celebrating the Mets. Then, he told me he was granting me a full pardon from my past,” he wrote. “I was overwhelmed with gratitude—thanking God for setting me free from my past, helping me become a better Man,Husband and Father.”
The former baseball player also served time in prison in an unrelated state case. In 2002, he was sentenced to 18 months in prison for violating his probation on a conviction on drug and solicitation of prostitution charges, according to ESPN. He was released after 11 months.
Strawberry is the second alum of Trump’s former reality show, “The Celebrity Apprentice,” to receive a pardon. Trump pardoned fellow contestant and former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich in February.
Trump has used his clemency powers more aggressively in his second term, pardoning more than 1,000 people charged in the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol and commuting the sentence of disgraced former GOP Rep. George Santos, along with other allies.
The president came under scrutiny during a recent interview with CBS News’ “60 Minutes” when he was pressed on a recent pardon for Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao on a money laundering charge.
“I don’t know who he is. I know he got a four-month sentence or something like that, and I heard it was a Biden witch hunt,” he said in the interview.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt later told reporters that Trump does not know Zhao “personally,” but that there is a “thorough review process” with the Department of Justice and White House Counsel’s office who offer Trump clemency recommendations.
This story has been updated with additional details.
CNN’s Marshall Cohen and Katelyn Polantz contributed to this report.
The-CNN-Wire
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