Trump upholds constitutional limits on the Clancy pardon plea

President Donald Trump stood with reporters near Air Force One at Shannon Airport in Ireland on Sept. 13, 2026, and answered the question put to him about Lindsay Clancy. He would not pardon her.

“It’s a very sad situation,” Trump said. “I certainly heard that, but look, it’s very sad. There is no winner there. There’s no win no matter what you do. Three children are dead.”

Then he fixed the legal boundary in a single clause: “It’s actually a state situation … not a federal.”

That is the controlling fact. The Constitution’s pardon power reaches only federal offenses. Clancy faces three counts of first-degree murder in Massachusetts for the deaths of Cora, 5; Dawson, 3; and Callan, 8 months, killed on Jan. 24, 2023. No federal charge is pending. A presidential pardon cannot erase a state murder indictment, and Trump declined to pretend otherwise.

The request had come days earlier from her attorney, Kevin Reddington, after Judge William Sullivan declared a mistrial on Sept. 4, 2026. On Good Morning America, Reddington addressed the president directly: “Mr. President, I would hope that you would consider this young lady – the type of person she is and what she’s been through – and consider a pardon.”

On CBS Boston he repeated the appeal while conceding the legal limit and asking instead for political pressure on the local prosecutor: “If President Trump feels that this is a case that warrants that type of intervention from the executive branch, if you will — even though, legally, it’s not a federal case — he certainly has an awful lot of clout. I think any type of help that we can get is helpful.”

Trump answered the lawyer without accepting the invitation. “He’s a good attorney. I’ve heard from other people he’s a very good attorney. I hope they can work it out. That’s something they have to work out.”

The trial that produced the mistrial had already consumed six weeks, more than 80 witnesses, and 35 hours of jury deliberation. The foreperson reported the panel was split 11-1, with eleven jurors inclined toward not guilty by reason of insanity and one juror refusing to return that verdict. Sullivan declared the mistrial. A hearing is set for Sept. 29, 2026, to decide what follows.

Clancy, who worked as a labor and delivery nurse before the killings, attempted suicide afterward and was left paralyzed from the waist down. Prosecutors allege she sent her ex-husband, Patrick Clancy, out on an errand so she would be free to commit the killings. The defense has maintained she was not criminally responsible because of severe mental illness after childbirth. Reddington has argued that critics lack the full picture: “These people don’t understand. They don’t know what she went through. They didn’t see her text messages. They didn’t see her journal. They didn’t see the notes that she wrote.”