Stone’s plan also proposed a pardon for former Seminole County, Fla., Republican tax collector Joel Greenberg, who had been indicted on charges that included the sex trafficking of an underage girl. The previous month, Greenberg had written to Stone to ask for help securing a pardon and they discussed a potential $250,000 fee, the Daily Beast has reported. The report said that Stone denied interceding on Greenberg’s behalf.
Later in 2021, Greenberg agreed to a plea deal and to cooperate with investigators on inquiries into possible sex offenses allegedly involving Gaetz, previously a friend of his, The Post and other outlets reported. Greenberg’s attorney said he declined to comment. Gaetz denies any improper activity with underage girls.
On Jan. 15, Stone told the filmmakers he endorsed a proposal - one that was then not publicly known - for Trump to install Jeffrey Clark, a loyal senior Justice Department official, as attorney general. Stone outlined a scenario in which Trump would order acting attorney general Jeffrey A. Rosen to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate Biden. When Rosen refused, Stone said, Trump would oust him and appoint Clark.
“Clark, I think, would carry out the order of the commander in chief,” Stone told the filmmakers. News that Trump had indeed considered replacing Rosen with Clark was made public a week later.
Stone’s pardon wish list also included Michael Sessa and Victor Orena, former members of the Colombo crime family serving life sentences for murder and racketeering convictions in the 1990s. Their attorney, David I. Schoen, has also represented Stone.
After the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, Roger Stone drafted a five-page “Stone Plan” for Donald Trump to preemptively pardon Stone, Republicans in Congress and “the America First movement” from prosecution for their efforts to overturn Trump’s 2020 election defeat. Stone said he gave the plan to Trump.
Stone told the filmmakers he hoped to persuade Trump to hire Schoen to represent him in his Senate impeachment trial on charges of inciting an insurrection. With Schoen advising Trump, “all that pardon stuff is easy,” Stone said. (After Trump left office, Schoen did join his defense, and Trump was acquitted when less than the required two-thirds of the Senate voted to convict him.)
On Jan. 17, Stone and Schoen exchanged text messages about their talks with Trump. “I think you will hear from the president shortly,” Stone wrote. Schoen reported back that he spoke with both Trump and White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, saying the president telephoned him for what he called a “long call” and a “great call.”
Schoen told The Post that the calls with Trump and Meadows were focused on him joining Trump’s impeachment defense team. A spokesman for Meadows did not respond to a request for comment.
A spokesman for Trump acknowledged questions from The Post but did not provide responses to them.
But as Biden’s inauguration neared, Stone’s plan met stiff opposition from White House lawyers.
Schoen told Stone in a text exchange on Jan. 18 that Trump had called him again but was hesitant to commit to pardons. “He started to go down that road, but stopped,” Schoen wrote, adding that Trump “sees he is stymied by cip,” referring to Cipollone.