Republican presidential candidate Asa Hutchinson said he would not commit to pardoning former President Donald Trump if the latter won the nomination and general election.
In a Monday post on the social media platform X, the former Arkansas governor attempted to differentiate himself from his competitors, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley.
"Despite the pledge of Haley and DeSantis to pardon Donald Trump, I will not make that commitment," Hutchinson stated. "It is wrong to promise pardons to score political points, and it undermines the principle of equal justice."
Hutchinson, whose FiveThirtyEight average is at less than 1% in primary polling, made the comments in the wake of Haley and DeSantis telling voters that they would pardon Trump if they were to win.
"What's in the best interest of our country is to pardon him so that we can move on as a country and no longer talk about him," Haley reportedly said while campaigning in Plymouth, New Hampshire, last week.
DeSantis informed reporters that he already made the pledge and believes "we got to move on as a country," citing former President Gerald Ford's pardon of his predecessor, Richard Nixon.
Hutchinson has suggested that he plans to stay in the race until at least Super Tuesday in March despite his poor polling performance.
"By then, you're going to have a dramatic change, in my judgment, in the politics of the presidential race," Hutchinson told ABC's KHBS 29 in a November interview.
"You're going to have some that are up now that will be down," he continued. "Trump will be halfway through his trials. And so, I expect dramatic changes."