WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump issued a pardon Friday to Lewis “Scooter” Libby, offering forgiveness to a former chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney who was convicted of perjury and obstruction of justice in the leak of a CIA officer’s identity.

“I don’t know Mr. Libby,” Trump said in a statement, “but for years I have heard that he has been treated unfairly. Hopefully, this full pardon will help rectify a very sad portion of his life.”

In a statement explaining Trump’s action, the White House noted that in 2015, one of the key witnesses against Libby had recanted her testimony, among other factors.

The White House also said Libby’s past government service and his record since his conviction have been “similarly unblemished, and he continues to be held in high regard by his colleagues and peers.”

Libby was convicted of four felonies in 2007 – for perjury before a grand jury, lying to FBI investigators and obstruction of justice during an investigation into the disclosure of the work of Valerie Plame Wilson, a former covert CIA agent and the wife of former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV.

Libby was sentenced to 30 months in prison and fined $250,000, but his sentence was commuted by then-President George W. Bush. Although spared prison time, Libby was not pardoned.

Cheney lobbied Bush aggressively for a pardon for Libby, and Bush’s refusal reportedly caused a strain in the relationship between the two men.

Trump’s pardon has been under consideration for several months, two people familiar with the president’s thinking said.

Victoria Toensing, Libby’s lawyer, said Trump called her about 1 p.m. to break the news. She said Trump told her Libby was “a wonderful person who got screwed.”

“Justice called out for it, is what the president said to us,” Toensing said. “He was a good guy who got screwed. The facts are compelling.”

Toensing declined to say what conversations she had with the White House about Libby in recent days and weeks. She submitted materials to the White House last year asserting Libby’s innocence.

“Suffice to say, he’s thrilled,” she said of Libby.

Given the nature of Libby’s crimes, Trump came under fire from critics Friday after he took to Twitter to accuse former FBI Director James B. Comey of leaking classified information and lying to Congress.

“On the day the President wrongly attacks Comey for being a ‘leaker and liar’ he considers pardoning a convicted leaker and liar, Scooter Libby,” Rep. Adam B. Schiff, D-Calif., wrote on Twitter.