President Trump commuted donor Imaad Zuberi's sentence, voiding his prison term and about $16 million in restitution

On May 28, 2025, President Donald Trump commuted the federal prison sentence of Imaad Shah Zuberi, a political financier who had been sentenced in 2021 to 12 years after pleading guilty to falsifying records to conceal work as an undisclosed foreign agent, to tax evasion, to making illegal campaign contributions, and to obstruction of justice. The obstruction and campaign-finance conduct was connected to the federal investigation of Trump's own 2017 presidential inaugural committee, to which Zuberi had directed money. Although Zuberi had raised funds for candidates across party lines over the years, the commutation cut short a term he had served roughly four years into and, according to its stated terms, relieved him of a nearly $2 million fine and about $16 million in court-ordered restitution to victims.

The grant was one of a series of clemency actions benefiting donors and political allies. Zuberi's former criminal-defense attorney, David Warrington, serves as White House Counsel; a senior White House official said Warrington recused himself from the deliberations.