President Donald Trump on May 27 announced that he would soon grant pardons to reality TV stars Julie and Todd Chrisley, who were convicted of bank fraud, tax evasion, and other financial crimes.
The reality stars of the show “Chrisley Knows Best” were convicted of defrauding Atlanta-area community banks out of more than $30 million through fraudulent loans in June 2022. The pair was also convicted of tax evasion.
Trump said that he planned on pardoning the couple within 24 hours.
During a Tuesday call with Savannah Chrisley, the couple’s daughter, Trump said, “Your parents are going to be free and clean and I hope that we can do it by tomorrow.”
Trump said that the couple “was given pretty harsh treatment ... I hear they’re terrific people, this should not have happened.”
“Mr. President, I just want to say thank you for bringing my parents back,” son Grayson Chrisley told Trump during that call.
Savannah Chrisley, who was left as sole caretaker of her younger brother as sister, has long pushed for the release of the couple. In a pardon petition, the family alleged that the conviction was based on an illegal raid and relied on compromised evidence.
Savannah Chrisley also campaigned for Trump as a prison reform advocate. She spoke at the Republican National Convention in 2024.
Alex Little, the family’s attorney, praised the pardon, which he said “corrects a deep injustice and restores two devoted parents to their family and community.”
“President Trump recognized what we’ve argued from the beginning: Todd and Julie were targeted because of their conservative values and high profile. Their prosecution was tainted by multiple constitutional violations and political bias,” Little said.
“Todd and Julie’s case is exactly why the pardon power exists. Thanks to President Trump, the Chrisley family can now begin healing and rebuilding their lives.”
Savannah Chrisley also campaigned for Trump as a prison reform advocate. She spoke at the Republican National Convention in 2024, where she described her family as having been “persecuted by rogue prosecutors.”
“I’ll never forget what the prosecutors said in the most heavily Democratic county in the state, before an Obama-appointed judge. He called us the ‘Trumps of the South,’” Savannah Chrisley said at the convention. “He meant it as an insult but, let me tell you, boy, do I wear it as a badge of honor.”
Last summer, a three-judge panel in the 11th Circuit Court upheld the conviction, but found signs that Julie Chrisley had been over-sentenced for her role in the bank fraud scheme. The court remanded the issue to lower courts to be reconsidered at the time.
Since being incarcerated, the Chrisleys have become known as federal prison reform advocates, pushing for better conditions in federal prisons.
In November 2022, Todd was sentenced to 12 years in federal prison while Julie received a seven-year sentence. The couple has appealed their conviction and maintained their innocence.
A release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia at the time said that the couple had specifically defrauded Atlanta-area banks of more than $36 million in personal loans.
“The Chrisleys, with the help of their former business partner, submitted false bank statements, audit reports, and personal financial statements to Georgia community banks to obtain the loans. The Chrisleys spent the money on luxury cars, designer clothes, real estate, and travel—and used new fraudulent loans to pay back old ones.
“After spending all the money, Todd Chrisley filed for bankruptcy and walked away from more than $20 million of these fraudulently obtained loans.”
Additionally, the U.S. attorney’s office said, they conspired to defraud the IRS with the assistance of Peter Tarantino, the couple’s accountant, who was also convicted.
“To evade collection of half a million dollars in delinquent taxes owed by Todd Chrisley, the Chrisleys opened and kept the corporate bank accounts only in Julie Chrisley’s name. But after the IRS requested information about bank accounts in Julie Chrisley’s name, the Chrisleys transferred ownership of the corporate bank account to a relative to further conceal their income from the IRS.”
Between 2013 and 2016, the couple did not file a tax return, according to the U.S. attorney’s office.
The couple is best known for their reality TV show “Chrisley Knows Best,” which followed the family, centering around Todd—who presented himself as a successful real estate tycoon. The show was filmed in the suburbs of Atlanta, before moving to Nashville during later seasons.
“Growing Up Chrisley,” a spin-off focusing on Chase and Savannah Chrisley, premiered in 2019.
The pardons come after Trump announced that he would pardon Scott Jenkins, former sheriff of Virginia’s Culpeper County, who received a 10-year prison sentence following a federal bribery conviction.
In January, the president also issued broad pardons for some of those arrested in connection with the events of Jan. 6, 2021.
