PENSACOLA, Fla. (WKRG) — A day after being pardoned by President Donald Trump, reality TV star Todd Chrisley was released from the Federal Correctional Institution in Pensacola, Florida, on Wednesday.
“We can confirm that Todd Chrisley has been released from the custody of the Bureau of Prisons on Wednesday, May 28, 2025,” a Federal Bureau of Prisons Office of Public Affairs spokesperson said in an email to Nexstar’s WKRG.
Chrisley, known for the program “Chrisley Knows Best,” was found guilty along with his wife, Julie, of bank fraud and tax evasion in 2022. Todd was sentenced to 12 years in prison while Julie was sentenced to seven. Both Chrisleys reported to their respective prisons in January 2023.
On Tuesday, May 27, Trump called their daughter, Savannah Chrisley, to let her know that he was pardoning her parents. White House officials shared video of that conversation from the Oval Office.
“Your parents are going to be free and clean, and I hope we can do it by tomorrow,” Trump said in the video of the call.
“I don’t know them, but give them my regards,” he added.
It’s unclear when his wife, Julie, will be released. She was sent to a prison in Kentucky.
“Chrisle Knows Best” ran from 2014 through 20203 and chronicled the couple’s life in Georgia.
Savannah Chrisley spoke at the Republican National Convention (RNC) last July, where she used her remarks to assert her parents were the victims of a “two-faced justice system,” echoing rhetoric used by Trump and his supporters to downplay his legal troubles.
On Wednesday, she posted on Instagram a photo of Trump in the Oval Office holding one of a pair of signed documents. She wrote: “God is still writing your story. He’s Not Late. He’s Not Distant. HE’S NOT DONE, & What is coming is MORE than you could’ve imagined.”
She briefly spoke with the media ahead of her father’s expected release.
The Chrisleys’ attorney, Alex Little, said Tuesday that Trump’s pardon “corrects a deep injustice” in which the celebrity couple were “targeted because of their conservative values and high profile.”
Before she was pardoned, Julie Chrisley had been scheduled for release in January 2028, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons website. Todd Chrisley was to remain imprisoned until September 2032.
During the couple’s trial, prosecutors said the Chrisleys hadn’t yet become TV stars when they and a former business partner submitted false documents to banks in the Atlanta area to obtain fraudulent loans. New loans were taken out to pay off the old ones, according to prosecutors, until Todd Chrisley filed for bankruptcy, walking away from more than $20 million in unpaid loans.
The Chrisleys’ defense attorneys had argued that an IRS officer gave false testimony at their trial and that prosecutors lacked evidence to support convictions.
A panel of judges of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the Chrisleys’ convictions last year.
The Hill’s Brett Samuels and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
