Biden issues pardon for son Hunter
The president said Hunter was singled out because of politics.
President Joe Biden on Sunday signed a “full and unconditional” pardon for his son Hunter, saying he “wrestled” with the decision but believed that “raw politics” had “infected” the process that led to the younger Biden’s criminal convictions on gun and tax charges.
“No reasonable person who looks at the facts of Hunter’s cases can reach any other conclusion than Hunter was singled out only because he is my son — and that is wrong,” the president said in a statement.
Biden made the announcement Sunday before getting on a plane to Angola. The decision is a complete 180 from the promises made by Biden administration officials who were unequivocal about whether or not the president would pardon his son. Just last month, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters that “our answer stands, which is no.”
The president stated the same when his son was found guilty this summer of possessing a gun while being a user of crack cocaine. He also pleaded guilty this fall to charges of failing to pay taxes.
If he hadn’t been pardoned, Hunter Biden would have faced two separate criminal sentencings this month. He faced a sentencing in Delaware on Dec. 12 in the gun case. A jury convicted him of those charges this summer after a week-long trial that resurrected painful and ugly moments from the Biden family history.
And on Dec. 16, Hunter Biden would have been sentenced again by a California judge in the tax case. In that case, he pleaded guilty to multiple tax crimes, admitting he chose not to pay $1.4 million in taxes over several years.
Federal authorities began investigating Hunter Biden during the first Donald Trump administration, but news of the probe did not become public until after Joe Biden defeated Trump in 2020. Biden declined to replace the Trump-appointed U.S. attorney overseeing that case, instead letting him stay in the role to finish the investigation. And last year, Attorney General Merrick Garland made the U.S. attorney, David Weiss, a special counsel. Both decisions helped stave off allegations Joe Biden was meddling in the process.
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