President Joe Biden has long vowed not to pardon his son Hunter, who was scheduled to be sentenced this month on gun and tax charges. But on Sunday, the president did it anyway.
Comprehensive forgiveness does not cover only Hunter Biden’s convictions in two cases in Delaware and California, but also any other “offenses against the United States that he committed or may have committed or participated in during the period from January 1, 2014, to December 1, 2024.” .
Biden is hardly the first president to use his power to pardon those close to him. But it was still a surprising reversal for a man who had promised to restore norms and respect for the rule of law.
What is forgiveness anyway?
The US Constitution says the president has the power to grant pardons, which includes both pardons and commutations. A pardon pardons federal crimes; substitution reduces penalties but is not as broad. The power had its roots in English law – the king could grant pardon to anyone – and it reached across the ocean to the American colonies and stayed there. The US Supreme Court has determined that presidential pardon powers are very broad. And presidents use the power liberally: Donald Trump granted 237 pardons during his four years in office, and Barack Obama granted pardons 1,927 times in his eight years. Presidents have pardoned drug offenses, fraud convictions and Vietnam-era draft dodgers, among many other things.
But the president can only grant pardons for federal offenses, not state ones. Impeachable convictions also cannot be forgiven.
What crimes is Hunter Biden accused of?
Hunter Biden He was sentenced in June lying on a federal form when he bought a gun in 2018 and swore he wasn’t an addict. Just months later, he pleaded guilty to the charges accusing him of a scheme to avoid paying at least $1.4 million in taxes. Prosecutors claimed he lived lavishly in violation of the tax code, spending his money on things like strip clubs and luxury hotels — “in short, everything but taxes.”
Both cases arose from a period in Hunter Biden’s life in which he struggled with drug and alcohol abuse before getting sober in 2019.
After salacious and embarrassing details about Hunter Biden’s life were released at a gun trial, the president’s son said he agreed to plead guilty to tax charges to spare his family another embarrassing criminal trial.
The tax trial was also expected to reveal details about Hunter Biden’s foreign affairs, which the Republicans said get hold of try to portray the Biden family as corrupt.
Hunter Biden was scheduled to be sentenced in two cases this month by judges in California and Delaware that Trump nominated to try.
Special Prosecutor David Weiss’ office did not say whether prosecutors planned to seek prison time. The tax charges carried up to 17 years behind bars, and the gun charges were punishable by up to 25 years in prison, although federal sentencing guidelines were expected to call for far less time and it was possible that the younger Biden would avoid prison altogether.
Didn’t Biden say he wouldn’t pardon his son?
That. Hunter Biden has been under federal investigation since 2020. He reached a deal with federal prosecutors to plead guilty to misdemeanor tax violations last year and would have avoided prosecution in a gun case as long as he stayed out of trouble for two years.
But the plea hearing quickly unrolled when the judge expressed concern about the unusual aspects of the deal. He was subsequently charged in those two cases, and claimed that he was singled out because he is the president’s son.
The president said to reporters earlier this summer that he will not pardon his son.
“I am extremely proud of my son Hunter. He overcame addiction. He is one of the smartest and most decent people I know,” he said. “I submit to the jury’s decision. I will do it and I will not forgive him.”
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said as recently as November 8 that Biden would not pardon his son.
Why did Biden break his promise?
In his statement on Sunday, Biden said his son was “selectively and unfairly prosecuted.” Biden was concerned – what Hunter Biden was like — about his political opponents.
Also, the president is no longer running. He promised no pardons before dropping out of the presidential race in June.
In his statement, the president said it was clear his son was treated differently than other defendants in similar predicaments. The plea deal unraveled, and Biden’s political opponents took credit for pressuring the process, he said.
“No reasonable person looking at the facts of Hunter’s cases can come to any conclusion other than that Hunter was singled out simply because he is my son — and that is wrong. There have been efforts to break Hunter – who has been sober for five and a half years, even in the face of relentless attacks and selective prosecution. In trying to break Hunter, they tried to break me – and there’s no reason to believe they’ll stop there. That’s enough.”
Have other presidents pardoned their family members or friends?
That. In his final weeks in office, Trump pardoned Charles Kushner, the father of his son-in-law Jared Kushner. He also pardoned multiple allies convicted in special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia probe. Trump announced plans to nominate the elder Kushner over the weekend to be the American envoy to France in his next administration.
President Bill Clinton pardoned his half-brother Roger Clinton in 2001, after serving time in prison on drug charges. Clinton also pardoned his former business partner Susan McDougal, who was sentenced to two years in prison for her role in the Whitewater real estate deal.
