US President Donald Trump pardoned five former professional American football players convicted of various crimes.
Trump Administration ‘forgives’ various high-impact crimes
The White House pardon manager, Alice Marie Johnson, announced the pardons this Thursday for former NFL players Joe Klecko, Nate Newton, Jamal Lewis, Travis Henry and Billy Cannon, who died, who were charged for drug trafficking and perjury crimes.
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“As American football reminds us, excellence is based on determination, grace and the courage to rise again. This is our nation. Grateful to Donald Trump for his constant commitment to second chances. Mercy changes lives,” Johnson wrote on the social network X.
Today, the President granted pardons to five former NFL players—Joe Klecko, Nate Newton, Jamal Lewis, Travis Henry, and the late great Dr. Billy Cannon.
As football reminds us, excellence is built on grit, grace, and the courage to rise again. So is our nation.
Special thanks… pic.twitter.com/Y4FC5lQwGE
— Alice Marie Johnson (@AliceMarieFree) February 13, 2026
In turn, he also thanked Jerry Jones for personally sharing the news with Nate Newton. “Today I have in my hands Nate’s pardon; What a blessed day!” he said.
Joe Klecko, who played for the New York Jets, pleaded guilty to perjury after lying to a federal grand jury investigating insurance fraud; Newton pleaded guilty to a federal drug trafficking charge after authorities discovered $10,000 in his truck, as well as 79 kilos of marijuana in a car with him, driven by another man; Lewis, a former Baltimore Ravens and Cleveland Browns player, pleaded guilty in a drug case in which he used a cellphone to try to make a deal shortly after being selected in the 2000 NFL draft.
For his part, Henry, who played for the Denver Broncos, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to traffic cocaine for financing a drug trafficking ring that transported the drug between Colorado and Montana and Cannon, who played with the Houston Oilers, the Oakland Raiders and the Kansas City Chiefs, admitted to counterfeiting money in the mid-1980s and died in 2018.
The reason why Trump granted clemency to these former NFL players is currently unknown.
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