1. United States
2. Calif.
3. Letter

You need to open a formal investigation into Donald Trump's use of presidential pardons as a transactional tool. At a rally in San Antonio, Trump admitted he pardoned Representative Henry Cuellar — a man facing federal bribery charges involving $600,000 in alleged bribes from Azerbaijan — and then expected Cuellar to switch parties or drop out of his race in return. When Cuellar didn't, Trump called it "a tremendous act of disloyalty." That is a confession, not a complaint. The pardon power exists to correct injustice, not to build political loyalty. What Trump described is a quid pro quo in everything but name. Congress has both the authority and the obligation to scrutinize this. If we let a president openly trade pardons for political favors without consequence, we've gutted one of the most serious checks on executive power. I expect you to act on this now.