President Donald Trump said on Wednesday he would issue a “full and unconditional PARDON” of Rep. Henry Cuellar, a Democratic congressman from South Texas who was charged last year with bribery and acting as a foreign agent.
Trump, who accused the Biden administration of weaponizing “the Justice System against their Political Opponents,” also said he was pardoning the congressman’s wife, Imelda Cuellar.
“Henry, I don’t know you, but you can sleep well tonight — Your nightmare is finally over!” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
Trump suggested Cuellar, a Democrat who sometimes voted with the Republican Party, was targeted for speaking out against some of President Joe Biden’s policies.
“Sleepy Joe went after the Congressman, and even the Congressman’s wonderful wife, Imelda, simply for speaking the TRUTH,” he said. “It is unAmerican and, as I previously stated, the Radical Left Democrats are a complete and total threat to Democracy!”
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Cuellar responded on X, writing: “I want to thank President Trump for his tremendous leadership and for taking the time to look at the facts. I thank God for standing with my family and I during this difficult time. This decision clears the air and lets us move forward for South Texas.”
He added: “This pardon gives us a clean slate. The noise is gone. The work remains. And I intend to meet it head on.”
Cuellar was charged in 2024 with accepting $600,000 in bribes from two foreign entities, according to an indictment released by the Justice Department. The indictment alleged that Cuellar accepted payments from Azerbaijan’s state-run oil and gas company after they had been laundered into shell companies owned by his wife.
Cuellar denied the allegations at the time, saying in a statement: “I want to be clear that both my wife and I are innocent of these allegations. Everything I have done in Congress has been to serve the people of South Texas.”
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries defended Cuellar in an interview with CNN Wednesday, saying that he is a “highly-valued member of the House Democratic Caucus.”
“Listen, the reality is this indictment was very thin to begin with, in my view,” Jeffries said. “The charges were eventually going to be dismissed, if not at the trial court level by the Supreme Court, as they’ve repeatedly done in instances just like this.”
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This article has been updated with additional reporting.
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