President Donald Trump hit pause on his own rally to hand out pardons, live and on stage.
At his midterm campaign rally in Wasilla, Alaska, on Tuesday, Oct. 13, 2026, he called two diesel shop owners up and handed them presidential pardons.
The two men, Zachary Czubak and Patrick Fleming, pleaded guilty in 2022 in a Clean Air Act case. White House aide Natalie Harp carried the clemency documents to Trump at the Curtis D. Menard Memorial Sports Center. He signed them in front of the cheering crowd and held one up for everyone to see.
Trump said onstage that the two men were wrongly charged. The Justice Department under former President Joe Biden, he said, had targeted the way Alaskans live. He said he read about the case, looked into it and then granted the pardons.
Trump said: “When you give somebody a pardon, they say that means — and I don’t know how this works and why it’s an expression, but it’s well-used — that means you’re as clean as a newborn baby’s ass. I never understood that. Why is that so clean?”
“Think of it: They want to put them in jail for 10 years because they fixed an engine. How sick?” the president said.
“This Means the World to Me”
Both men spoke briefly to the rally. “This means the world to me,” one of them said.
The men told the crowd the case wrecked friendships and families. Fleming said they were not criminals and only wanted to help Alaskans. They also urged the crowd to reelect the state’s congressional Republicans.
Trump said onstage that he was also taking care of a third person, and that he was granting all three co-owners of the shop unconditional pardons. The third co-owner, Michael Hanzuk II, was pardoned in September, before the rally, CBS News reported.
What the Shop Really Did
The three men co-owned Arm Rippin Toys, Inc., an Anchorage shop specializing in diesel vehicles. All three men pleaded guilty in 2022 to one count of conspiracy to violate the Clean Air Act.
Federal prosecutors said the shop charged fees ranging from $1,140 to $5,445 to strip out emission control systems. The shop modified physical components and blocked the vehicles’ diagnostic systems from detecting a problem, prosecutors said, and the trucks were left releasing more pollution.
The co-owners and employees falsified and tampered with emissions monitoring devices on at least 37 vehicles between July 2019 and September 2020, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said in 2022. The work brought the business about $100,000.
The Justice Department said each vehicle’s emissions shot up: particulate matter by about 40 times, nitrogen oxides about 310 times, carbon monoxide about 120 times and non-methane hydrocarbons about 1,100 times. Trump did not mention those figures at the rally.
Defeat equipment brings an enormous jump in air pollution from even a single vehicle, Scot Adair said in a 2022 statement. He was then special agent in charge of the Environmental Protection Agency’s Criminal Investigation Division in Alaska. People who put health and the environment at risk for profit would keep being held accountable by the agency and its law enforcement partners, he said.
The Justice Department said Czubak and Hanzuk each received five years of probation, a $66,000 fine and 180 hours of community service. Fleming, who was sentenced later, got the same probation, fine and community service, CBS News reported. None of the three served prison time.
Not the First Mechanic Trump Has Pardoned
Trump referred at the rally to a similar case. He pardoned another Alaska diesel mechanic, Wasilla shop owner Mackenzie “Mac” Spurlock, in July 2026. Prosecutors charged Spurlock with violating the Clean Air Act by removing pollution control systems. Spurlock and his supporters argued that the engine modifications were needed to keep emissions systems from failing in Alaska’s frigid weather.
In all, Trump pardoned nine people in July 2026 who were convicted under similar Clean Air Act laws. He has characterized those convictions as punishment for “fixing their car.”
Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, praised the Spurlock pardon in July 2026. Overzealous federal prosecutors were to blame, he said, and he argued that EPA rules should be adjusted for cold-weather states.
In January 2026, the Justice Department announced it would stop bringing criminal Clean Air Act charges for tampering with onboard diagnostic devices. The Trump administration has loosened fuel economy standards. It also scrapped an EPA policy that gave automakers credits for start-stop emissions systems. Political allies have repeatedly received Trump’s clemency, as have people who, like him, say they were prosecuted unfairly.
A $5,000 Promise and a Nail-Biter Senate Race
Trump staged the rally in part to help Sullivan against Democratic challenger Mary Peltola and to lift Rep. Nick Begich, R-Alaska, before the November midterms. The major political forecasters rate the Senate race a toss-up.
Trump’s net approval in Alaska stood at about minus 16 points in early October, per Civiqs’ state-level tracker. He carried the state by about 13 points in November 2024.
Trump pressed Alaskans to repeal the state’s ranked-choice voting system, and he told the crowd it is a way for Democrats to cheat. He warned that another candidate named Dan Sullivan, a retired teacher, is on the ballot, and he claimed Democrats put the man forward to confuse voters. That candidate took 2.5 percent in the August Senate primary, which was enough to reach the general election. Trump told the crowd that share could decide the race.
Trump pledged at the same Wasilla rally to send a $5,000 check to every adult American if Republicans hold both chambers on Nov. 3. Independent analysts estimate the total cost would exceed $1 trillion.
Trump also claimed at the Alaska stop that Taiwan agreed to buy 30 percent of the gas from a proposed pipeline project in the state for 20 years and invest more than $4 billion. Taiwanese officials had not confirmed those terms. He also said South Korea would invest $50 billion in the project, but South Korean leaders said they made no such commitment, Alaska Public Media reported. The stop opened a two-day Western swing, and on Wednesday, Oct. 14, he held rallies in Bullhead City, Ariz., and Kalispell, Mont.
