(Luis Cornelio, Headline USA) President Donald Trump did not immediately rule out pardoning Sean Combs, the embattled music mogul known as Diddy, who faces federal sex-trafficking and prostitution charges.
At an Oval Office event to celebrate Elon Musk, Fox News’s Peter Doocy asked Trump whether he would ever consider pardoning Combs, who Trump once described as a good friend. The president did not immediately shut down the idea, even after Comb said Trump needed to be “banished.”
Diddy does not need a pardon. He did a lot of bad things, to many young kids. I hope President Trump does not!! pic.twitter.com/9vIaPHBkft
— Anna 🇺🇸 (@realAnn_29) May 31, 2025
“Well, nobody’s asked. You had to be the one to ask, Peter, but nobody’s asked,” Trump replied. “But I know people are thinking about it. … First of all, I’d look at what’s happening, and I haven’t been watching it too closely, although it’s certainly getting a lot of coverage.”
Trump conceded that he hasn’t spoken to Combs in years.
“He used to really like me a lot, but I think when I ran for politics, he sort of—that relationship busted up,” Trump added. “From what I read—I don’t know, he didn’t tell me that—but I’d read some little bit nasty statements in the paper.”
Combs, whose net worth once reached $740 million, has vocally opposed Trump. In a 2020 interview for Revolt, the rapper-turned-accused sex trafficker said that “white men like Trump need to be banished.”
He also warned that if Trump were re-elected, “there will be a race war” and “there’s gonna be bloodshed.”
Combs’s political activism goes back to 2008, when he credited himself and hip-hop for helping elect Barack Obama.
Democrats ARE Sex Traffickers.
From left to right, Mary J Blige, Russell Simmons, Sean "Diddy" Combs and Jay-Z on stage at the Last Chance For Change Rally in support of then-Sen. Barack Obama on Nov. 2, 2008 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. (Photo by Larry Marano/Getty Images) pic.twitter.com/WBzDcK2eKZ— TheyCallMeDoc (@TheyCallMeDoc1) September 23, 2024
He hosted a “Last Chance for Change” two days before that election to urge black Americans to vote for Obama. “It’s bigger than us,” Combs said then. “We have to do it for our children; we have to do it for the people that died for us to have the right to vote.”
In 2020, Combs went to bat for Joe Biden and then became an ally of Kamala Harris. She even kicked off an online event that Combs organized to raise the alarm about the COVID-19 pandemic.
Despite Combs’s leftist activism and threats, Trump said political loyalty wouldn’t influence his judgment in a potential pardon.
“I would certainly look at the facts,” he told Doocy. “If I think somebody was mistreated—uh, whether they like me or don’t like me—it wouldn’t have any impact on me.”
