#President Biden Pardons His Son Hunter:

[reasoningdaily]

President Biden Pardons His Son Hunter:

President Biden issued a full and unconditional pardon of his son Hunter on Sunday night after repeatedly insisting he would not do so, using the power of his office to wave aside years of legal troubles, including a federal conviction for illegally buying a gun and for tax evasion.

In a statement issued by the White House, Mr. Biden said he had decided to issue the executive grant of clemency for his son “for those offenses against the United States which he has committed or may have committed or taken part in during the period from Jan. 1, 2014, through Dec. 1, 2024.”

He said he did so because the charges against Hunter were politically motivated and designed to hurt the president politically.

“The charges in his cases came about only after several of my political opponents in Congress instigated them to attack me and oppose my election,” Mr. Biden said in the statement. “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.”

He added: “There has been an effort to break Hunter — who has been five and a half years sober, even in the face of unrelenting attacks and selective prosecution. In trying to break Hunter, they’ve tried to break me — and there’s no reason to believe it will stop here. Enough is enough.”

It was a remarkable turnaround for a man whose presidency and five-decade career was built in part on the idea that he would never interfere with the administration of justice. In 2020, he made the case that former President Donald J. Trump should be ousted from office to restore that kind of independence in America’s democracy, and he argued the same in 2024.

But in his statement, Mr. Biden sought to make the case for interfering after all, accusing his political enemies of going after his son in ways that anyone else would not have been. He said that he still believed in the justice system, but added, “I also believe raw politics has infected this process and it led to a miscarriage of justice — and once I made this decision this weekend, there was no sense in delaying it further.”

In fact, the president’s announcement came at the same time that Mr. Trump made it clearer than ever that his second term would be focused on retribution and revenge against Mr. Biden — with Hunter Biden as a prime target. The president-elect on Saturday said he would name Kash Patel, a loyalist who has vowed to go after Mr. Trump’s enemies, as F.B.I. director.

In his statement, Mr. Biden said, “I hope Americans will understand why a father and a president would come to this decision.”

After Mr. Biden announced the pardon, Hunter Biden issued a statement of his own.

“I have admitted and taken responsibility for my mistakes during the darkest days of my addiction — mistakes that have been exploited to publicly humiliate and shame me and my family for political sport,” he said. “I will never take the clemency I have been given today for granted and will devote the life I have rebuilt to helping those who are still sick and suffering.”

He expressed relief, but also some bitterness over what he perceived as an unnecessary prosecution, after his father told him he was being pardoned when the family gathered in Nantucket, Mass., for the Thanksgiving holiday, according to two people familiar with the situation.

Many of the president’s allies and critics had expected him to pardon his son, even though he and his spokeswoman had denied for months that he had any intention of doing so. NBC News first reported on Sunday evening that Mr. Biden had in fact decided to issue the pardon, which means his son will face no federal charges stemming from crimes he may have committed during that period.

But the move quickly drew expressions of scorn from Mr. Biden’s political adversaries and others and called into question the president’s honesty, given the many public statements that he made saying he would not pardon his son.

Clay Travis, a conservative radio host, posted on social media, “It’s really extraordinary how blatantly they lie.” Senator Charles Grassley, Republican of Iowa, said on social media that he was “shocked” Mr. Biden pardoned his son because “he said many many times he wouldn’t & I believed him Shame on me.”

Jenna Ellis, a former lawyer for Mr. Trump’s 2020 election team, posted: “Joe Biden pardoned three turkeys this week,” a reference to the annual pardoning of two actual turkeys at the White House just before Thanksgiving.

The reversal by Mr. Biden came just 50 days before he is set to leave the White House and transfer power to Mr. Trump, who spent years attacking Hunter Biden over his legal and personal issues as part of a series of broadsides against the Biden family.

Mr. Biden for much of his time in office said he would refrain from commenting on high-profile criminal cases, even related to his son, to make good on a commitment to maintain the independence of the Justice Department.

After the president’s son was convicted on three federal felony counts for illegally buying a gun, Mr. Biden said he would not pardon or commute the sentence of his son.

“I said I’d abide by the jury decision,” Mr. Biden told reporters during the Group of 7 summit in June. “I will do that.”

The White House press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, repeatedly said that Mr. Biden would not issue a pardon for his son, often chiding reporters for asking the question.

In the summer of 2023, she was asked whether there was “any possibility” that the president would end up pardoning his son. She answered simply, “No.” When the reporter tried to ask the question again, she cut the question short and said: “I just said no. I just answered.”

​​Hunter Biden faced as much as 25 years in prison for lying on a federal form about his drug addiction when he bought a handgun in 2018, but he was unlikely to receive a sentence near that length. First-time offenders who did not use weapons for a violent crime typically receive much lighter sentences. Legal analysts had said it was possible that the president’s son could receive a year or less behind bars or even probation.

Justice Department officials have long been expecting — and dreading — the pardon of Hunter Biden, according to multiple law enforcement officials who spoke on condition of anonymity. Several law enforcement officials have for years described the case as a necessary but thankless task, given the political tempest around it and the intense personal dynamic between the president and his son.

It is not the first time a president has used his executive power to commute the sentence of a family member. On his last day in office, President Bill Clinton pardoned his half brother Roger Clinton for old cocaine charges. A month before leaving office, Mr. Trump pardoned his son-in-law Jared Kushner’s father, Charles Kushner, for tax evasion and other crimes.

Both Roger Clinton and Charles Kushner had long since completed their prison terms, and the pardons were about forgiveness or vindication rather than avoiding time behind bars. Over the weekend, Mr. Trump said that he would nominate Charles Kushner to be the U.S. ambassador to France.

Hunter Biden pleaded guilty in September to nine federal tax charges in Los Angeles after telling his legal team that he refused to subject his family to another round of anguish and humiliation after the gut-wrenching gun trial in Delaware earlier in the year.

The dramatic development signaled the final stages of a fraught investigation of more than five years into the period when Mr. Biden bankrolled his drug and alcohol addiction by leveraging his last name into lucrative overseas consulting contracts — and not paying taxes.

Mr. Biden had been set to remain free on bond until his sentencing hearing, which was scheduled for mid-December

[destielmemenews]

"The pardon means Hunter Biden won’t be sentenced for his crimes, and it eliminates any chance of his being sent to prison, which was a possibility. Once the judges overseeing his cases are notified of the pardon, they’ll likely cancel the sentencing hearings, which were slated for December 12 in the gun case and December 16 in the tax case.

Biden said in the statement that he decided to issue the pardon because his son was “selectively, and unfairly, prosecuted,” saying that “Hunter was treated differently” from people who commit similar crimes."

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[zvaigzdelasas]

Lol [1 Dec 24]

[reality-detective]

First we heard this 👆

And now this 👇 happens

Do you see the lies? The hypocrisy? The corruption?

Hunter Biden broke gun laws, he broke the FARA Act, and worst of all, he broke the Mann Act by sex trafficking women across the country.

This pardon is Joe Biden’s admission that Hunter is a criminal.

Biden tried to throw President Trump’s sons in jail, but he lets his son off free even though he’s a convict. His FBI and DOJ raided Barron’s bedroom and Melania’s closet at Mar-a-Lago.

Joe Biden is a liar and a hypocrite, all the way to the end. 🤔

[deadpresidents]

Thoughts on Biden pardoning his son?

This country just elected a man President who was convicted of 34 felonies and never sentenced and had dozens of other felony criminal charges just magically dropped. I'm fine with the pardon.

Plus, I love Joe Biden. He's buried two of his children and he had the unconditional power to keep his only surviving son from going to prison, so I always figured he'd pardon Hunter. If anyone is outraged by this, they better buckle the fuck up for the next four years.

[mariacallous]

President Biden has signed a presidential pardon for his son Hunter Biden, a reversal from previous statements he would grant him neither a pardon nor commutation.

Why it matters: Presidents regularly sign pardons at the end of their terms. They rarely involve cases where their own family members are in the middle of the legal process. Hunter was set to appear at sentencing hearings on Dec. 12 and Dec. 16, NBC News reported.

"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," Biden said in a statement on Sunday.

"There has been an effort to break Hunter – who has been five and a half years sober, even in the face of unrelenting attacks and selective prosecution. In trying to break Hunter, they've tried to break me – and there's no reason to believe it will stop here. Enough is enough."

Zoom in: Hunter Biden was the first child of a sitting president to face criminal charges. He was convicted on felony gun charges this summer, and pleaded guilty on felony tax charges.

The pardon issued Sunday covers all acts between Jan. 1, 2014 to Dec. 1, 2024.

[genderkoolaid]

President Joe Biden is commuting the sentences of roughly 1,500 people who were released from prison and placed on home confinement during the coronavirus pandemic and is pardoning 39 Americans convicted of nonviolent crimes. It's the largest single-day act of clemency in modern history. The commutations announced Thursday are for people who have served out home confinement sentences for at least one year after they were released. Prisons were uniquely bad for spreading the virus and some inmates were released in part to stop the spread. At one point, 1 in 5 prisoners had COVID-19, according to a tally kept by The Associated Press. [...] The clemency follows a broad pardon for his son Hunter, who was prosecuted for gun and tax crimes. Biden is under pressure from advocacy groups to pardon broad swaths of people, including those on federal death row, before the Trump administration takes over in January. He’s also weighing whether to issue preemptive pardons to those who investigated Trump’s effort to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election and are facing possible retribution when he takes office. Those pardoned Thursday had been convicted of nonviolent crimes such as drug offenses and turned their lives around, White House lawyers said. They include a woman who led emergency response teams during natural disasters; a church deacon who has worked as an addiction counselor and youth counselor; a doctoral student in molecular biosciences; and a decorated military veteran. [...] Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass., and 34 other lawmakers are urging the president to pardon environmental and human rights lawyer Steven Donziger, who was imprisoned or under house arrest for three years because of a contempt of court charge related to his work representing Indigenous farmers in a lawsuit against Chevron. Others are advocating for Biden to commute the sentences of federal death row prisoners. His attorney general, Merrick Garland, paused federal executions. Biden had said on the campaign trail in 2020 that he wanted to end the death penalty but he never did, and now, with Trump coming back into office, it’s likely executions will resume. During his first term, Trump presided over an unprecedented number of federal executions, carried out during the height of the pandemic.

[republicansaredomesticterrorists]

F—k those hypocritical MAGAts and the other hypocrites on cable news. They’re putting a rapist felon in White House so they need to sit down and shut the f—k up.

[eugenedebs1920]

Good for him!! It’s the only illicit thing he’s done. The utterly useless waste of taxpayer money, and the countless hours that could have been spent doing something useful by James Comer and all those idiots, is astounding! Because they couldn’t find any dirt on Biden, after a decade of trying, they went after his drug addict son. I don’t know how many of you out there have had substance abuse problems, but when you’re balls deep in a good addiction, you don’t admit to yourself, or anyone else that you have a drug problem. To go after Hunter for checking no on a box asking if you smoke marijuana (which is a ridiculous question) or have drug use problems, and federally charging him for MAYBE being under the influence of drugs, it’s petty and dumb. If he was anyone else, no one would know, and no one would care. I don’t know much about the tax evasion charges but… Still. The crap Hunter, Joe and the whole Biden family went through because Joe Biden didn’t have skeletons in his closet, is deserving of a pardon.

The Biden crime family! Thats f*ckin HILARIOUS!!!!! Trump is, by far, to the tenth degree, the most corrupt, criminal, seditious person to EVER rise to the highest office in the land! And just to show how absolutely stupid this country is, he (supposedly) got elected TWICE! For double the corruption and unethical behavior. The whole Trump 2.0 administration is sexual assailants, felons, flat out criminals, compromised Russian assets, sycophants, family members, and unqualified trump loyalists. F*ck Trump!!

Good job Joe! Another splendid thing you accomplished while in office. We forgive the lie you told. F*ck!!! We heard over 30 thousand last Trump term, wouldn’t surprise me if Trump doubled that this time.

Love ya Joe!! ☮️🇺🇸

[theonion]

President Joe Biden issued a “full and unconditional” pardon to his son Hunter Biden last Sunday night. In light of the controversial decision, The Onion looks back on the history of presidential pardons.

[generallemarc]

Oh, it is a good day to not be a liberal! Alright lefties, let's see all the many ways that you'll try to defend/excuse Biden for doing the exact same thing you criticized Trump for. Bonus points if you use identical logic behind why Trump did it. "It was a politically-motivated witch-hunt, even though by saying that I'm implying that the judge was paid off or otherwise manipulated into making the verdict they did and thus indirectly declaring the existence of a massive conspiracy that wants to convict people of doing crimes they provably did" is my personal favorite, but I'm sure there'll be many others.

[liberty1776]

Joe Biden's pardon of his son Hunter is the most sweeping Presidential pardon since Gerald Ford pardoned Richard Nixon. It represents the deep corruption and contempt for the rule of law that has characterized the Biden presidency. But it is also important for another reason: the pardon is an attempt to erase the Biden family involvement with Ukraine from the time of the 2014 coup through the millions that passed into family accounts. Our current state of near WWIII is directly tied to the Biden family seeking personal riches in Ukraine.

[ghostpalmtechnique]

Jim Clyburn should resign immediately.

You can let him know that the rest of us don't believe in surrendering to fascism using the form here: https://clyburn.house.gov/email-me/

or call his DC office at (202) 225-3315

[reality-detective]

Biden pardons his son Hunter despite previous pledges not to... And before you freak out about this 👆 Biden was never really president and illegitimate presidents cannot pardon anyone. This will NOT stand. 🤔

[black-fist-order]

Republicans fume after President Joe Biden pardons his son Hunter

Fkn' finally...!