The pardon comes weeks before President Biden leaves office and transfers power to President-elect Donald Trump, who has spent years attacking Hunter Biden over his legal and personal issues.
Outgoing US President Joe Biden has issued a full and unconditional pardon to his son Hunter after repeatedly insisting he would not do so.
Biden said in a statement issued by the White House that he had decided to issue an executive pardon to his son “for those crimes 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.”
How did Biden justify his decision?
According to The New York Times Biden said he made the decision because the charges against Hunter were politically motivated and intended to hurt him politically.
“The charges in his case came only after many of my political opponents in Congress incited them to attack me and oppose my election,” Biden said in the statement.
“No reasonable person looking at the facts of Hunter’s case could come to any conclusion other than that Hunter was chosen solely because he is my son, and that is wrong,” he added.
“There were efforts to break Hunter, who had remained sober for five and a half years, even in the face of relentless attacks and selective prosecution,” he added.
In his statement, Biden sought to justify the intervention, accusing his political enemies of pursuing his son in ways no one else would have done. He said he still believed in the justice system.
What does the decision have to do with Trump’s threats?
President Biden’s announcement came at the same time that Trump has made it clearer than ever that his second term will focus on exacting revenge on Biden, with Hunter Biden a prime target.
The president-elect said Saturday he would appoint Kash Patel, a loyalist who has vowed to go after Trump’s enemies, to the FBI post.
“I hope the American people understand why the father and the president made this decision,” Biden said in his statement.
After Biden announced the pardon, Hunter Biden issued a statement of his own.
“I have acknowledged and taken responsibility for my mistakes during the darkest days of my addiction, mistakes that were exploited to humiliate and shame me and my family publicly for political reasons,” he said.
“I will never take for granted the compassion I was granted today and will dedicate my rebuilt life to helping those who are still sick and suffering,” he said.
He expressed relief, but also some bitterness, at what he considered an unnecessary trial, after his father told him he had been pardoned.
Many of the president’s allies and critics had expected him to pardon his son, although he and his spokeswoman denied for months that he had any intention of doing so.
The network reported NBC News Biden has in fact decided to issue a pardon, meaning his son will not face any federal charges stemming from crimes he may have committed during that time.
What is Trump’s reaction to the decision?
But the move quickly drew expressions of disdain from Biden’s political opponents.
In a post on social media, Trump called the pardon “an abuse and miscarriage of justice!”
Biden’s retreat came just 50 days before he is scheduled to leave the White House and transfer power to Trump, who has spent years attacking Hunter Biden over his legal and personal issues as part of a series of broadsides against the Biden family.
Biden has said, for most of his time in office, that he would refrain from commenting on high-profile criminal cases, even involving his son, to uphold his commitment to preserving the independence of the Justice Department.
What are Hunter’s charges?
After the president’s son was convicted of three federal criminal counts of illegally purchasing a gun, Biden said he would not pardon or commute his son’s sentence.
Hunter Biden faced up to 25 years in prison for lying on a federal form about his drug addiction when he bought a gun in 2018.
This is not the first time a president has used his executive authority 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, Trump pardoned his son-in-law Jared Kushner’s father, Charles Kushner, for tax evasion and other crimes.
