The Republican candidates for president are struggling with the question of whether they’d pardon President Trump, but Mr. Trump has yet to be asked if he’d accept clemency or pardon himself, both options rejected by President Clinton during his legal troubles.

“The president,” the Constitution states, has “power to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, except in cases of impeachment.” Since Mr. Trump, like Mr. Clinton and President Nixon, faces charges outside that for which he was impeached, the next president could expunge federal convictions he faces, though not state ones.

President Ford pardoned Nixon after acceding to the office from the vice presidency, so there was no question on the campaign trail. The Democratic nominee in 2000, Vice President Gore, did face that sticky timing, but Mr. Clinton spared him by having an answer ready.

“President Clinton is way ahead of you on this,” Mr. Gore told the American Society of Newspaper Editors in 2000. He “would neither request nor accept a pardon” nor give himself one, “so that’s the answer to the question,” although it wasn’t. Mr. Gore never said whether he’d offer one to his predecessor.

“As has been stated by numerous legal scholars,” Mr. Trump tweeted in 2018, “I have the absolute right to PARDON myself, but why would I do that when I have done nothing wrong?” Since Mr. Trump maintains his innocence of current charges, he may stick to that line.

No president has attempted to use the pardon power on the man in the mirror and the idea sparks objections. “It’s not proper to do it,” a law professor at Yale, Akhil Amar, told the New York Times of Mr. Clinton doing so. “You can’t be a judge in your own case. It’s a long-standing principle of Anglo-American jurisprudence” that he felt “doesn’t pass the smell test.”

The press, however, has a nose for a tough question, so they’ve put it to each Republican candidate. Vice President Pence, pressed on “The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show,” might have wished for Mr. Gore’s easy answer. “These are serious charges,” he said to the dismay of Mr. Trump’s supporters, “and I take the pardon authority very seriously … and I just think it’s premature to have a conversation about that right now.”

Mr. Trump’s closest rival, Governor DeSantis, did the dance with more surefootedness, saying on the same show last month that “we,” meaning his administration, “will be aggressive at issuing pardons,” not naming Mr. Trump but saying only he’d offer free passes “on a case-by-case basis.”

Senator Tim Scott called the classic Washington play of rejecting “hypotheticals,” while Governor Hutchinson told Scripps News that clemency for the former president would be a “misuse of the pardon power.” The former candidate for California governor, Larry Elder, told Scripps that it was “very likely” he’d offer a pardon.

Governor Nikki Haley told Clay Travis and Buck Sexton that she’s “inclined” to pardon while also calling it “really premature” as Mr. Trump has “not even been convicted.”  The biotech executive, Vivek Ramaswamy — outside the Miami courthouse where the former president was entering his not guilty pleas on 37 federal counts — challenged his rivals to join him in committing to erase the former president’s slate on Inauguration Day.

Governor Christie handled Mr. Trump’s fate with the greatest political skill, though still leaving wiggle room. “I can’t imagine if he gets a fair trial that I would pardon him,” he said on Fox News Channel, noting that for someone to “accept a pardon, you have to admit your guilt,” a cagey move by the former federal prosecutor since Mr. Trump’s default remains, as in 2018, to deny culpability.

The issue isn’t going anywhere, and each time it surfaces, candidates will face a stark choice: Alienate Mr. Trump’s wing of the party or hand Democrats a cudgel to use against them. The former president could save them the headache by rejecting a pardon like Mr. Clinton, but why? Each time an opponent is asked the question, it weakens their hand and strengthens his — a political scenario that must smell sweet to him indeed.