In early October, Donald Trump chatted briefly with reporters, one of whom asked whether he’s planning to pardon his top aides before leaving office. “It’s not something I’m thinking about now,” the president replied, though he quickly added that he believes he can “do whatever I want.”A month later, it’s clearly something he’s “thinking about now.”

In the days and weeks that followed the Republican’s brief comments, he told Time magazine that he’s prepared to issue pardons to many members of his administration. Soon after, Trump sat down with Newsmax for a lengthy interview, and when the discussion turned to pardons, he said, “I can tell you this, I don’t want to see my people go through — because these people are lunatics on the, on the left — I don’t want to see people that work for me go through years of nonsense, hire lawyers and everything else, all for nothing.”This week, the president went a little further still during a podcast interview with The New York Post’s Miranda Devine.

To be sure, the premise of the relevant question was rather odd. Devine suggested that unnamed Democratic officials are secretly plotting to arrest Republican megadonor Elon Musk, “seize his factories,” and “nationalize” his SpaceX company — an agenda that no Democratic officials or congressional candidates have actually endorsed.

Trump responded that he doesn’t expect any of that to happen, but suggested that a presidential pardon is very much on the table. “We’ll have to protect them,” he said.

Asked about possible preemptive pardons for Musk and others who’ve worked in his administration, Trump replied, “Well, that’s what [Joe] Biden did. He gave everybody a pardon.”He added, “I would if I needed to, sure. I would not even think about it. I’d do it, I did it for J6,” referring to his Day One pardons for Jan. 6 rioters, including violent convicted felons who clashed with police officers.

In case this isn’t obvious, his Democratic predecessor didn’t not pardon “everybody.”Rather, Biden pardoned specific people he believed were likely to be unjustly targeted by his vengeful Republican successor fixated on using the levers of federal power to retaliate against perceived foes. The list was limited to former Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Mark Milley, Dr. Anthony Fauci, those who worked on the bipartisan January 6th congressional investigation, members of his immediate family, and police officers who testified before the Jan. 6 committee. There was no blanket pardon for White House aides or others who worked in the Biden administration.

Nevertheless, looking ahead, time will tell whether the incumbent president follows through on this talk, specifically as it relates to Musk, who’s invested nearly half a billion dollars into the midterm elections in support of the Republican cause. But of particular interest is Trump might act.

To hear the Republican tell it, he’s prepared to “protect” members of his team from Democratic scrutiny, though if the midterm elections go the Democrats’ way, his focus will be less on a future administration that might begin in 2029, and more on a Democratic-led chamber that would begin in a couple of months. Or put another way, if Trump is going to move on this, it’s worth watching to see if he acts .

As for the practical effects, let’s also note that pardons for Musk and others on Team Trump would shield them from possible federal prosecutions, though they would have no bearing on likely congressional investigations. I emphasize this because, as Reuters’ Brad Heath noted, a pardon for Musk might very well make it harder for him and other witnesses to assert their Fifth Amendment privileges. Watch this space.