Brooklyn, New York — A Washington lobbyist and attorney who helped a nursing home operator secure a presidential pardon from Donald Trump has been arrested and charged with trying to extort that same client out of $500,000 — allegedly recruiting an “enforcer” to physically threaten the man’s son.
Joshua Nass, 34, of Charleston, South Carolina, was arrested Friday outside a Manhattan hotel by FBI agents and charged with attempted Hobbs Act extortion in federal court in Brooklyn. He appeared before a magistrate judge Saturday, where he was released on a $5 million bond secured by five properties and $50,000 in cash. He was also placed on GPS monitoring.
If convicted, Nass faces up to 20 years in prison.
A Pardon, a Contract, and a Debt
The case traces back to Nass’s work on behalf of Joseph Schwartz, a New Jersey-based nursing home operator who pleaded guilty in 2024 to a $38 million employment and payroll tax fraud scheme involving nursing homes he owned across the country. Schwartz operated facilities under the Skyline Management Group banner and had also been charged with Medicaid fraud.
In November 2025, Trump pardoned Schwartz — a decision that, according to earlier reporting, came through Nass’s connections to pro-Israel evangelical networks close to the White House.
According to court documents, Nass entered into an agreement with Schwartz in December 2025 to provide lobbying and clemency advocacy services in exchange for $600,000. A $100,000 payment was made, but when the client’s son said he couldn’t immediately pay the remaining balance and asked about a payment plan, Nass took it as an “insult.”
That’s when, according to federal prosecutors, things turned dangerous.
An ‘Enforcer’ and Escalating Threats
Starting in January 2026, Nass allegedly recruited a confidential witness — later used by the FBI to build its case — and paid him to pressure the client’s son into paying up. He provided the witness with addresses for both the father and son and told him to “do anything and everything” to force payment.
Court documents allege Nass suggested options including physically assaulting the son or “forcing him into a car with masked men” to threaten him. According to an FBI agent’s signed affidavit, Nass said he didn’t want the witness behaving “like a human being” with the son.
In one incident, the witness showed up at the son’s New York-area home — only to have the door shut in his face.
Nass was arrested Friday afternoon outside his hotel, the same day he expected to meet with the confidential witness, according to prosecutors.
“Rather than honestly representing his client, Joshua Nass allegedly chose to shake him down by hiring an enforcer to extort payment,” said James Barnacle Jr., assistant director in charge of the FBI’s New York field office.
Broader Context: The Pardon Business Under Scrutiny
The case adds another data point to growing concerns about how Trump’s clemency process operates — and who profits from it. Federal lobbying disclosures show Nass’s firm listed “federal presidential pardon advocacy” as a lobbying issue and reported $100,000 in income from Schwartz-related work in the final quarter of 2025.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt has dismissed such concerns, saying anyone paying lobbyists for pardons is “foolishly wasting their money” and that Trump “doesn’t even know who these so-called ‘lobbyists’ are.”
Nass’s arrest comes as courts and regulators continue probing the financial entanglements between nursing home operators and the legal, political, and business ecosystems around them. Just this week, a federal judge ordered UnitedHealth to open its books on the AI system accused of denying post-acute care coverage to elderly patients — another sign that scrutiny of the money flows in long-term care is intensifying.
U.S. Attorney Joseph Nocella Jr. said Nass “plotted the violent extortion of one of his own clients and hired an individual to ‘do anything and everything’ to force the client’s son to pay for services.” Nass’s attorney had not responded to requests for comment as of Saturday.
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