Now that the wildly eccentric zookeeper Joe Exotic has become a household name due to the phenomenally popular Netflix docuseries “Tiger King,” the buzz has centered on whether or not he could receive a presidential pardon. Donald Trump Jr. has floated the possibility, albeit with his tongue firmly planted in his cheek.
As the Netflix show chronicles in detail, Joe Exotic, real name Joseph Maldonado-Passage, was sentenced to 22 years in jail after an Oklahoma jury convicted him in 2019 of animal cruelty and contracting a hitman to kill his chief rival, animal rights activist Carole Baskin of Big Cat Rescue (the hitman did not go through with the act). Though not conclusively proving it one way or the other, the documentary postulated he may have been set up by his business partner, Jeff Lowe. In a recent Facebook post, Exotic publicly asked Trump to grant him a presidential pardon, arguing that key witnesses lied under oath and that prosecutors simply wanted to get a win with no regard for the truth.
“I am being sent to Prison because a seasoned con man wanted my zoo so bad for free that he set me up in a plan he devised to look like I participated in his murder for hire scheme to get me out of his way to take over,” Exotic said in the Facebook post.
“Mr. President, I am pleading with you to please have this looked into,” he concluded. “I am currently incarcerated at the Grady County Jail in Oklahoma and facing 20 – 50 years in prison for doing the same thing every zoo and sanctuary owner has had to do at one time or another.”
During an appearance on Sirius XM’s “Jim Norton and Sam Roberts” radio show, Donald Trump Jr. said he enjoyed “Tiger King” and joked that his father could pardon him just to spark media outrage.
“He’s asking for a presidential pardon,” Roberts said, as reported by Fox News.
“I have heard that, is that true? You guys really want it to be true, don’t you?” responded Trump Jr.
Roberts then laid out the scenario by which Trump Jr. could make the presidential pardon possible: “I feel you, Don, Jr., can go in, make a meeting with your dad and go, ‘Look, I know we’re all dealing with corona and there’s a lot going on right now, but at the same time, maybe a presidential pardon for poor Joe Exotic who’s in there?'”
“Maybe not right now, but I can generally be for this just for the meme,” Trump Jr. responded. “And just for frankly watching the media reaction to this thing. It would be pretty amazing to ultimately see that.”
Getting more serious, Trump Jr. said that while the case against Joe Exotic did not paint him in an innocent light, it did not necessarily paint him as exceedingly guilty either, arguing that his sentence appears “sort of aggressive.”
“Now, I don’t even know exactly what he was charged with … I watched the show, but it was like, I don’t know exactly what he was guilty of or wasn’t,” said the president’s son. “It doesn’t seem like he was totally innocent of anything. But when they’re saying, ‘We’re putting this guy away for 30 years,’ I’m saying that seems sort of aggressive.”
Related: ‘Tiger King’ Subjects Doc Antle, Jeff Lowe Slam Netflix Documentary As Salacious Sensationalism