It was the summer of 2017 when Thomas Franco met Carlos Watson, a journalist and political commentator who seemed to be building a media empire. Over the next five years, Franco — a partner at the New York private equity firm Clayton, Dubilier & Rice — put almost $4 million into Watson's startup Ozy Media and urged friends to invest too.

But the company was largely an illusion. A federal jury in Brooklyn convicted Watson of fraud in July 2024. A judge later ordered him to repay investors almost $37 million, millions of it to Franco.

Hours before Watson was due to report to prison in March of last year, President Trump commuted his nearly 10-year sentence. The clemency grant wiped away the restitution.

In an interview, Franco said he felt victimized all over again. "Clearly the president has constitutional authority to grant clemency, and I certainly don't question that authority," Franco told CBS News. "But authority and accountability are two very different things."

Franco is just one of the many crime victims who may never recover money a court ordered they be repaid. All told, Mr. Trump's clemency orders have erased at least $119 million in unpaid restitution since January 2025, a CBS News investigation has found.

By contrast, clemency orders by former President Joe Biden erased $14,000 during his four years in office, Justice Department records show. The vast majority of Biden's orders were commutations that left financial penalties intact, rather than pardons.

Asked about Watson's commutation, a White House official said that "the length of Watson's sentence as well as the amount of financial penalties was widely recognized as egregious."

CBS News reviewed court judgments in over 160 clemency orders Mr. Trump issued from January 2025 through October 2026, including restitution that remained unpaid when clemency was granted. The review excluded his more than 1,500 blanket pardons and commutations tied to the 2020 election and the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot, in which courts typically ordered standard restitution of $500 or $2,000 to help cover damage to the U.S. Capitol.

Those who lost out on restitution range from small family food businesses to community banks, candy maker Mars Wrigley, the IRS and other agencies, actor Terry Crews and a trust in the name of baseball star Alex Rodriguez. The $119 million figure doesn't cover restitution prosecutors sought but judges hadn't yet ordered — such as the $660.8 million sought from former Nikola CEO Trevor Milton before the president granted his pardon.

The $119.4 million in restitution no longer owed to crime victims is just a fraction of more than $1 billion in federal fines and restitution impacted by Trump's clemency orders since January 2025.

Another $119.9 million in fines are no longer owed to the federal Crime Victims Fund.

Restitution requested by prosecutors but canceled by clemency grant prior to court ruling total about $665.8 million

Finally, about $170.9 million restitution affected by clemency that is jointly owed with co-defendants who did not receive clemency brings the total to $1.1 billion.

These erased debts represent a hidden cost of the booming pardon economy that has emerged in Mr. Trump's second term. As the president embraces a freewheeling approach to his pardon power, a new industry has blossomed in Washington in which wealthy, well-connected defendants have hired lobbyists and lawyers with ties to the president to press their cases directly with the White House.

About 70% of Mr. Trump's second-term clemency actions have bypassed the Justice Department's pardon office, the traditional route, and that number is 92% when including the Jan. 6 cases, a CBS News investigation found. Brett Tolman, a former U.S. attorney in Utah who handles clemency cases, told one potential client that he sends applications only to the White House — never to the Justice Department — because "it's the fox watching the hen house."

At least 18 clemency recipients whom Mr. Trump freed from orders to pay fines or restitution had White House ties, according to court filings, campaign finance disclosures and other records reviewed by CBS News. In those cases, lawyers, lobbyists, or close political allies of Mr. Trump advocated for them — or the convict or their family members had made donations to support the president's reelection campaign.

Authority and accountability are two very different things.
-Thomas Franco, partner at the private equity firm Clayton, Dubilier & Rice

Watson is among them. His clemency case was handled by Adam Katz, a lawyer who represented Rudy Giuliani in a defamation case over his efforts to overturn the 2020 election, according to sources familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Court records show that Arthur Aidala, who has represented Giuliani and former Trump adviser Steve Bannon, worked on Watson's criminal appeal. (Katz and Aidala declined to comment.)

In a statement, White House spokeswoman Lauren Bis said Mr. Trump "exercises his constitutional authority to issue pardons and commutations at his discretion" and that "anyone spending money to lobby for pardons is foolishly wasting their money." She said the administration's review process includes the White House counsel's office, the Justice Department, White House "pardon czar" Alice Johnson, and the president.

Ed Martin, who led the Justice Department's pardon office until September, previously told 60 Minutes that judges who impose large restitution orders are "completely disconnected from reality." He added, "It's a failure. A failure in every way. Not serving the victims, not serving justice."

Victims facing "an uphill climb"
Restitution is an ancient legal concept, but in the U.S. it grew out of the victims' rights movement of the 1970s. Unlike fines, which go into a federal fund, restitution goes directly to victims. Mark Osler, a law professor at the University of St. Thomas in Minnesota who runs a pro bono clemency clinic, called it "the rare appearance of restorative justice" in the criminal justice system.

Victims who have seen restitution ripped away can still sue, since clemency doesn't erase civil liability, said Rachel Barkow, a New York University law professor who runs the clinic with Osler. But those lawsuits can be costly and slow. Restitution orders also have teeth — the government can keep clawing money back for 20 years after a defendant's release by taking part of their paycheck, putting a lien on their property or keeping their tax refunds.

Clemency ends all of that.

We all have those bills. The bills did not go away.
-Theresa Dante, cook at a Skyline nursing home in South Dakota

Victims "now face an uphill climb trying to get the money that they lost," Barkow said.

The largest single sum wiped away in Mr. Trump's second term was almost $49 million that a judge ordered Andres and Adriana Camberos to pay their victims.

The Camberos siblings were convicted in October 2024 of a scheme to get steep discounts from food manufacturers by claiming the goods would be sold in Mexico or to prisons and rehab facilities, then reselling them in the U.S. at a markup — often undercutting the manufacturers' own prices. A court ordered them to repay 19 companies, ranging from Mars Wrigley Confectionery, owed $22 million, to True Made Foods, a small veteran-owned business in Virginia, owed $17,800. Mr. Trump's clemency for both siblings in January 2026 erased that debt.

Abraham Kamarck, the founder and CEO of True Made Foods, told CBS News the siblings sold his products on Amazon for less than he did, which cut into his own sales there. He said he never expected to get his money back, but was "absolutely shocked" to learn they had received clemency.

"Obviously it was painful for me to lose that money and to get undercut," Kamarck said. "We've just constantly been fighting to survive, and this is just one more kick in the balls that we get over and over again."

A White House official claimed that the Camberos siblings were the target of a "political prosecution" from the Biden administration.

It was Adriana Camberos' second grant of clemency from Mr. Trump. On his last day in office in 2021, he commuted her sentence for an earlier fraud. Prosecutors said the siblings launched the grocery scheme within weeks of her release.

The siblings were represented for their clemency by Katz and Stefan Passantino, a deputy White House counsel in Mr. Trump's first term. (Katz declined to comment on the case, and neither Passantino nor the Camberos siblings responded to requests for comment.)

Others who hired Republican lawyers had large debts erased. Former reality TV stars Todd and Julie Chrisley owed $17 million to victims of their scheme to defraud Atlanta-area community banks out of more than $36 million in loans. Their daughter Savannah Chrisley spoke at the 2024 Republican National Convention and named Tolman as a lawyer helping with the clemency effort 10 months before Mr. Trump pardoned her parents.

The Chrisleys and Tolman did not respond to requests for comment. A White House official said there is "reason to believe" the sentencing was politically motivated, but did not elaborate.

Some clemency recipients went further: They reclaimed money they had already paid out. Mr. Trump pardoned convicted nursing home executive Joseph Schwartz in November 2025, three months into a three-year prison sentence.

Schwartz had paid nearly $1 million to a lobbying firm tied to right-wing operatives Jack Burkman and Jacob Wohl to push for clemency, lobbying records show.

His company, Skyline Healthcare, ran more than 100 nursing homes in 11 states before it collapsed in 2018. Theresa Dante, a cook at a Skyline nursing home in South Dakota, said the company took health insurance premiums out of workers' paychecks but never paid the insurers.

"There was no restitution at all for any of his victims, none of us," she said. "The bills did not go away." (A lawyer for Schwartz did not respond to requests for comment.)

Schwartz had been sentenced in April 2025 to pay $5 million in restitution to the IRS and a $100,000 fine, and paid that judgment in full, court records show. An appeals court vacated his conviction and sentence in light of the pardon. A district court then approved Schwartz's request to recoup the money he paid.

A Justice Department official said people pardoned while their appeals are pending are generally entitled to refunds, though federal judges in Washington, D.C. have split on the question in Jan. 6 cases.

A White House official called Schwartz's sentence "exceptionally harmful" to the defendant, whom they described as "a 65-year-old man already in deteriorating health." The official cited the $5 million he paid as a reason for clemency, without noting that it was refunded.

Beyond the $119 million
The $119 million tally for canceled restitution payments excludes nearly $120 million more in court-ordered fines Mr. Trump's clemency actions erased. That money would have gone to the federal Crime Victims Fund, which helps pay for victims' medical bills, counseling and shelters.

Nor does the tally include the $660.8 million that prosecutors argued Trevor Milton owed to victims. A judge never ruled on that request, because Mr. Trump pardoned Milton in March 2025, about two weeks after prosecutors made the demand for restitution. There's no way to know how much money the judge would have ordered Milton to repay.

Milton and his wife donated almost $3 million from September to October 2024 to political groups associated with Mr. Trump's reelection, campaign finance records show, about five months before the pardon.

In a statement to CBS News, Milton called the $660.8 million figure "not attached to reality," saying prosecutors could not identify anyone who lost money because of his statements. Edgardo Ramos, the U.S. district judge who presided over Milton's trial in Manhattan, pushed back on a similar argument from Milton's lawyers in 2023, remarking at a hearing that there was "real loss to real people" who invested.

"I never donated any money to the Trump campaign expecting anything in return," Milton told CBS News. "The pardon was out of the blue and not expected and was not tied to anything."

A White House official said his prosecution was an "overreach" and that any "potential donations Milton may or may not have made played absolutely no role in the president's decision to pardon Milton."

"Money talks"
For some victims, Mr. Trump's clemency actions have confirmed a suspicion that the system favors those with money and connections.

Jason Galanis and Devon Archer, former business partners of Hunter Biden, were convicted over a scheme that sold bonds issued by the Wakpamni Lake Community Corporation — a tribal entity on South Dakota's Pine Ridge Reservation — and diverted the money. Prosecutors said the proceeds helped pay for Galanis' Bel Air estate, Manhattan apartment and luxury cars.

The two were among eight co-defendants ordered to repay over $80 million. Mr. Trump granted them clemency in March 2025, releasing both men from that debt. The victims are still owed money, but only from other co-defendants who did not receive clemency, court records show.

After their convictions, both men accused Hunter Biden of trading on his father's name to land deals overseas. Galanis made those claims in the Republican-led House impeachment inquiry into then-President Biden, where he was represented by Mark Paoletta, who was the White House budget office's top lawyer in Mr. Trump's first term and holds the same job now.

In a statement to CBS News, Galanis said he sought clemency "through ordinary and established channels" and is "profoundly grateful to President Trump for the mercy he demonstrated in granting my commutation." He said restitution proceedings have not concluded but declined to comment further. (Paoletta and Archer did not respond to requests for comment.)

A White House official said that Galanis "has accepted full responsibility for his conduct and has expressed genuine regret and remorse for his actions."

In a 2017 victim impact statement, the Wakpamni Lake Community Corporation said the fraud had damaged its standing with business partners.

The victims "felt betrayed" by the commutation, said a source close to the corporation, who spoke to CBS News on the condition of anonymity. The source said the corporation's leaders would not speak publicly because they fear retaliation from the Trump administration. "So they just have their heads down, and they're just recovering," the source said.

The Galanis scheme also cost school employees' retirement savings. His associates secretly took control of a firm managing money for the Omaha Public Schools pension fund and put $16 million of it into the tribal bonds, which turned out to be worthless.

"I am deeply disheartened that he was allowed to be absolved of any financial responsibility," Lou Ann Goding, who was then president of the Omaha school board and a trustee of the fund, said of Galanis. He "abused their retirement funds while living a life of luxury, and should be held accountable for that," she said.

After Mr. Trump commuted Galanis' sentence, his lawyers sought the return of more than $2 million in seized assets that had not yet been distributed to victims. A judge denied the request in a June 2025 order, writing that Galanis' argument rested on "a strained reading of the commutation order that enlarges its unambiguous text." Galanis has appealed that ruling.

This is money that I'd put away for my grandchildren.
-Jeffrey Rosenbery, retired wholesale produce distributor

In another case, that of David Gentile, a clemency order cut off victim payments before a court could demand them.

Gentile, the former CEO of the New York private equity firm GPB Capital Holdings, was convicted of running a $1.6 billion investment fraud that drew in more than 10,000 investors — many of whom put in their life savings. Prosecutors said GPB promised investors steady monthly payouts it claimed came from profits, when much of the money was investors' own cash handed back to them.

Gentile served only 12 days of a seven-year sentence when Mr. Trump freed him from prison in November 2025 and absolved him from any obligation to pay restitution. A White House official defended the commutation, saying GPB had warned investors in 2015 that some payouts might come from their own money.

Federal prosecutors in Brooklyn later gathered evidence that Gentile had discussed paying $2.5 million to secure his commutation, including in conversations with a retired Queens priest close to Mr. Trump, The New York Times first reported and CBS News confirmed.

An investigation into those alleged payments was in its infancy when political appointees at the Justice Department ordered the investigation shut down, according to sources familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The retired priest, Frank Mann, denied in an interview that any money was paid to help win clemency for Gentile.

"There was no lobbying and there was no money — zero," he told CBS News. "It's all crap."

Asked about the closed investigation, a Justice Department spokesperson pointed to a previous statement that its prosecutors "always work within the bounds of our enforcement priorities to hold bad actors accountable and ensure the efficient use of taxpayer resources." (A lawyer for Gentile did not respond to requests for comment.)

Prosecutors described GPB's victims as "hardworking, everyday people," including military veterans, teachers, nurses and small business owners. One was Jeffrey Rosenbery, a retired produce distributor in Nevada who voted for Mr. Trump three times and lost $250,000 to Gentile's firm. He said he was "infuriated" by the commutation.

"This is money that I'd put away for my grandchildren," he told CBS News.

CarolAnn Tutera, her sister and their 97-year-old mother lost about $500,000 in retirement and family savings they invested in GPB after Tutera's husband died. "That money could have gone to pay for the nursing home," she said of her mother's care.

Tutera expressed frustration at the message that the pardon sent to victims.

"Money talks," she said. "If you've got the money, you can pay to get your get-out-of-jail-free card. I just find that so disgusting."

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