President Nixon

President Nixon enters the account through a single consequential act: his 1971 presidential pardon of Jimmy Hoffa. In Frank Sheeran’s telling, the pardon returned Hoffa from jail to public and union politics, where he began fighting to reclaim the presidency of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters. Nixon is not developed as a personal presence; his importance is measured by what Hoffa’s release made possible.

The 1971 Pardon

Sheeran identifies Nixon’s pardon as the event that preceded Hoffa’s renewed effort to regain control of the union. The account does not describe the pardon’s negotiation, conditions, or Nixon’s motives. Instead, it marks a transition in Hoffa’s circumstances: after jail, he could again pursue the union presidency and speak publicly about the organization’s direction.

Hoffa’s Return to Public Conflict

According to Sheeran, Hoffa became difficult to talk to after his release. On radio, in newspapers, and on television, he spoke of exposing the mob, removing it from the union, and preventing it from using the pension fund. Sheeran regarded these declarations as hypocritical because, in his view, Hoffa had brought the so-called mob into both the union and the pension fund. He also believed that people who benefited from the fund would fear Hoffa’s promised intervention. These are Sheeran’s interpretations of the conflict that followed the pardon, not evidence of Nixon’s own intentions.

A Limited but Decisive Narrative Role

The book’s treatment of President Nixon is brief and instrumental: the pardon is the hinge between Hoffa’s imprisonment and his attempt to return to power. That return sharpened the danger Sheeran perceived around his friend and helped prompt his concern for Hoffa. The narrative offers no direct encounter between Nixon and Sheeran and no independent account of Nixon’s reasoning; it places Nixon at the threshold of events whose ensuing struggle is told through Sheeran’s recollection.