Commentary: She's a liar, swindler and cheat. So why wouldn't Trump pardon her?

"Touted as one of Time's "100 Most Influential People." At age 30, Holmes was regarded as a preternatural business talent - and, more impressively, described as the youngest self-made female billionaire in history - owing to her founding and stewardship of Theranos, a Silicon Valley start-up that promised to revolutionize healthcare by diagnosing a host of maladies with just a pinprick's worth of blood."

"It was all a big con job. Her medical claims were a sham. Theranos' technology was bogus. Even the husky TED-talking voice Holmes used to invest herself with greater seriousness and authority was a put-on. (The turtlenecks were an austere affectation she cribbed from Steve Jobs.) In January 2022, a San Jose jury convicted Holmes on four counts of fraud and conspiracy. At age 37, she became a case study in gullibility and greed."

"Now, Holmes - who spawned a best-selling book, podcasts, a documentary, a TV miniseries and, not incidentally, stole hundreds of millions of dollars from investors - is lobbying for a pardon from President Trump. And why not? Game knows game. Grift knows grift. Of all the powers a president wields, few match his awesome pardon authority. It is sweeping and life-changing. Idiosyncratic, resting wholly on personal whim, and irrevocable. Once granted, it is impossible to reverse."

Elizabeth Holmes rose to fame as Theranos founder and was celebrated as a young self-made billionaire and influential business figure. Theranos promised revolutionary blood testing but relied on false medical claims and bogus technology. Holmes adopted a cultivated persona and public image while the company misled investors and patients. A San Jose jury convicted her in January 2022 on fraud and conspiracy charges; she received an eleven-year, three-month sentence and began serving time in May 2023 at a women's prison camp. Holmes is now lobbying for a presidential pardon, underscoring the broad, idiosyncratic, and irreversible nature of clemency power.

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