Thousands of inmates apply for clemency; Michael Moore fantasizes about president releasing 460,000

Brett T. | 6:26 PM on July 13, 2015

@MMFlint Had me for a second. With a stroke of a pen, Obama could free more unjustly shackled than Lincoln. But Republicans would riot.

— Dmitri (@Rzhevsky) July 13, 2015

Michael Moore’s fantasy about President Obama freeing 460,000 prisoners incarcerated on drug charges doesn’t necessarily have to be a fantasy. Though President Obama announced today via a Facebook video that he has commuted the sentences of 46 drug offenders, who knows how much ink he has in that famous pen of his?

The Washington Post notes that, “Since the Obama administration announced last year that it would grant clemency to nonviolent drug offenders, more than 35,000 inmates, or about 17 percent of the federal prison population, have applied for early release,” a number which is almost certain to increase after today’s announcement.

The prisoners granted release today were all described a nonviolent drug offenders, although someone should let the fact-challenged Everytown for Gun Safety know that Dunning Wells was charged with unlawful possession of a firearm and possession of a firearm during and in relation to a drug trafficking crime. Perhaps Everytown could direct some of its anti-gun hysteria away from Cabela’s and toward the president for setting him free.