Elon Musk Shares Plea To Pardon Minnesota Officer Derek Chauvin

Recently, conservative commentator Ben Shapiro posted a video on social media, including X and YouTube, where he shared with his followers that he believes President Donald Trump should pardon Derek Chauvin, the Minnesota police officer convicted in the 2020 death of George Floyd.

Chauvin is currently serving a 22-and-a-half-year state sentence for second-degree unintentional murder, as well as a concurrent 21-year federal sentence for violating George Floyd's civil rights.

Shapiro also asked people to sign his online petition which features an open letter to President Trump that begins, "We write to urge you to immediately issue a pardon for Officer Derek Chauvin, who was unjustly convicted and is currently serving a 22-and-a-half year sentence for the murder of George Floyd and associated federal charges."

Federal prosecutors successfully argued that Chauvin's actions directly caused George Floyd's death, but Shapiro repeated defense claims that Floyd was high on fentanyl and had a pre-existing heart condition which led to his death.

Shapiro then stresses that this event was the start of BLM riots that "caused $2 billion in property damage in cities across the United States and set America’s race relations on their worst footing in recent memory."

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Needless to say, Shapiro's video, open letter, and petition stirred up a lot of controversy and now Elon Musk has weighed in.

Elon Musk Shares Ben Shapiro's Video On X

Elon Musk often shares videos and posts with his over 219 million followers and when he does he offers very few words. He recently did the same thing with Shapiro's video, but the few words he did offer are making headlines, especially since he's so close to President Trump.

Upon sharing the video this week, Musk added the sentence, "Something to think about", which may not be a ringing endorsement, but it obviously suggests he's open to the idea.

Could President Trump Pardon Derek Chauvin?

The big question in all of this is whether President Trump would or even could pardon Derek Chauvin. The action itself wouldn't be out of character considering In January, he pardoned two Washington, D.C. police officers convicted in the 2020 killing of Karon Hylton-Brown, a 20-year-old Black man who was killed.

Lt. Andrew Zabavsky and Officer Terence Sutton had been convicted on charges related to that pursuit that ended with 20-year-old Karon Hylton-Brown crashing his moped. Sutton was reportedly convicted of second-degree murder in Hylton-Brown’s death and both officers officers were also convicted of conspiracy to obstruct justice and obstruction of justice for trying to cover up the deadly incident.

Since being pardoned, both officers have been reinstated, which has caused controversy in Washington, D.C.

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When it comes to Derek Chauvin, even if President Trump decided to pardon him, it could only apply to his federal conviction. Multiple sources confirm that Chauvin's conviction for second-degree murder would still stand. Presidential pardons do not apply to state-level crimes.

So regardless of what Shapiro and Musk feel about the conviction, President Trump's powers are limited when it comes to any act of clemency in Chauvin's case. President Trump has yet to issue any statement related to this issue.