With 80 Percent Spike in Clemency Applications, Governor Cuomo Still Unlikely to Grant Them

Monarchs used to grant clemency to celebrate a birthday, raise an army or populate a colony. The president and all 50 governors still have some form of executive pardon power. And they most often use it at this time year as a sort of holiday surprise. But in the first of a three-part series on Clemency from WNYC's Race & Justice Unit, Gwynne Hogan reports, the pandemic is putting a new and desperate twist on the year-end tradition. Read the full story on Gothamist.com.