WASHINGTON, D.C. (LifeSiteNews) — Outgoing President Joe Biden issued a sweeping pardon Sunday evening to his troubled son Hunter for any known or unknown crimes committed over the span of a decade after repeatedly denying he would do so.
For years, the Biden family has been dogged by allegations of personal corruption and influence peddling. During the Obama years, the former vice president infamously boasted that he facilitated the firing of Ukrainian Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin, who had been investigating energy company Burisma Holdings (on whose board Hunter served despite lacking experience in the energy industry), by threatening to withhold a billion-dollar loan from the U.S. to Ukraine. Defenders claim that the move was about Shokin not prosecuting corruption aggressively enough, but critics suggest it was about Shokin potentially getting too close to Burisma and, by extension, Hunter.
In the months before the 2020 presidential election, the New York Post released a series of bombshell reports about a laptop belonging to Hunter that was delivered to and abandoned at a Delaware computer repair shop and contained scores of emails and texts detailing the Biden family’s international business activities, which exploited Joe’s political office by offering access to the highest levels of the federal government and the various worldwide connections made through that office. The story was initially maligned as “disinformation” but eventually acknowledged as real long after Biden was safely elected.
Earlier this year, Hunter was convicted on multiple felony counts for tax evasion and illegally purchasing a gun while under the influence of drugs, with sentencing slated for sometime this month. His father rendered sentencing moot over the weekend, however, by formally granting Hunter a “Full and Unconditional Pardon” for federal offenses “which he has committed or may have committed or taken part in during the period from January 1, 2014 through December 1, 2024.”
The president insisted that he kept his word to “not interfere with the Justice Department’s decision-making,” but maintained that Hunter “was singled out only because he is my son – and that is wrong. There has been an effort to break Hunter – who has been 5 1/2 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.”
The move, which not only saves Hunter from whatever sentence he might have received but also helps protect the president himself from future convictions against the son leading to legal jeopardy for the father, directly contradicts numerous denials by Biden and White House representatives that Hunter would be pardoned.
In a June ABC News interview, Biden answered “yes” that he would accept the jury verdict and that he had ruled out pardoning his son. “I’m extremely proud of my son Hunter. He has overcome an addiction. He is one of the brightest, most decent men I know. I abide by the jury decision. I will do that, and I will not pardon him,” he said at a press conference a week later. White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre repeatedly said “no” to the pardon question, including last month after Donald Trump won his return to the presidency.
As recently as November 26, Senior Deputy Press Secretary Andrew Bates reiterated Biden’s past denials on the subject, stating, “The president has spoken to this (…) I don’t have anything idea (sic) to add to what he’s said already.”
“Does the Pardon given by Joe to Hunter include the J-6 Hostages, who have now been imprisoned for years?” Trump reacted on Truth Social. “Such an abuse and miscarriage of Justice!”
“The pardon power was written in absolute terms, and a president can even, in my view, pardon himself. However, what is constitutional is not necessarily ethical or right,” George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley wrote. “This is one of the most disgraceful pardons even in the checkered history of presidential pardons. President Biden has lied to cover up a corruption scandal that reportedly brought his family millions in raw influence peddling. His portrayal of his son as a victim stands in sharp contrast to the sense of immunity and power conveyed by Hunter in his dealings.”