He says historically, it’s unusual for a president to exercise his clemency power so much during his last days in office. “Presidents have traditionally started granting commutations and pardons relatively early in their presidency, and they did it on a fairly regular basis throughout the course of their [time in office],” he tells Broadly. “So there wasn’t any pressure to do a huge number at the end because they already had a record of doing it all along. That’s a much more rational way to do this.”