Washington – U.S President Donald Trump announced on Wednesday that he is commuting the prison sentence of Sholom Rubashkin, the former head of what was the largest Kosher meat company in the United States, Agriprocessors. Rubashkin was sentenced in 2010 to 27 years in jail for 86 counts of financial fraud, however will now finish his sentence after serving only eight years.

The White House distributed a statement explaining that the decision was supported by former senior officials in the Department of Justice and by members of Congress from both the Democratic and Republican parties.

Rubashkin's family was known in the past for making major donations to political campaigns. Rubashkin himself also contributed thousands of dollars to political campaigns, mostly on the Republican side.

Rubashkin was convicted in 2009 of 86 counts of financial fraud that came to light after a government raid on the former Agriprocessors Inc. plant in Postville, Iowa, in which nearly 400 undocumented Guatemalan and Mexican workers were arrested.

In 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected an appeal by the former chief executive of Agriprocessors. Without comment, the high court refused to consider whether Sholom Rubashkin's sentence was excessive for a first-time, nonviolent offender, and whether he was entitled to a new trial based on evidence of alleged judicial misconduct in the case.

At the time, the case sparked an outcry from members of the legal and Orthodox Jewish communities, who supported Rubashkin's quest for a new trial.