More than a year after it became evident that Sam Bankman-Fried was positioning himself for clemency, the former FTX founder and CEO has submitted a formal application for a presidential pardon. Records on the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) website confirm the filing. Bankman-Fried previously received a 25-year prison sentence in March 2024 after his conviction on charges tied to the roughly $9 billion November 2022 collapse of the crypto exchange he built and operated. According to Bloomberg, Bankman-Fried submitted the request to the Justice Department’s Pardon Attorney’s Office and specifically asked for a “pardon after completion of sentence.” He filed from a low-security federal prison in California while his appeal of the conviction and sentence remains pending before the federal appeals court in New York. A decision in that case could come at any time. It’s currently unclear as to why Bankman-Fried requested a “pardon after completion of sentence” instead of seeking immediate clemency. That type of pardon is more commonly sought by people who have already finished serving their sentences and want to restore certain rights or remove the stigma of a conviction.
In a phone interview with Fox Business on Monday, Bankman-Fried addressed the question directly. When asked whether he wanted a pardon from the White House, he said, “Absolutely. It would be obviously, you know, ultimately up to the president, not up to me.”
