Pardonne moi

Donald Trump lied 30,573 times during his four years in office, and countless thousands more before and off faux outrage among Republicans and pious tut-tutting by the Washington press corps.

On a weekend when Trump made it crystal clear he planned to weaponize the Justice Department against his enemies by designating Kash Patel as FBI director, Biden offered a Sunday Night Surprise by going back on his word that he would not pardon his son, Hunter Biden, for felony tax and gun convictions.

Cue the faux angst, starting with the man convicted of 34 criminal fraud charges who will enter the Oval Office on January 20th as the first Convicted Felon President of the United States.

“Such an abuse and miscarriage of Justice!”

Wait, I thought he was THE victim of abuse and miscarriage of justice?

Hunter Biden faced sentencing in two separate cases this month on charges brought by a Trump-appointed prosecutor: for lying on a federal form by claiming he was not illegally using or addicted to drugs and for failing to pay at least $1.4 million in taxes.

As former federal prosecutor Barb McQuade declared:

“Based on the facts, most federal prosecutors would have declined to charge him. The botched misdemeanor guilty plea and sentence of diversion were a tell that the special counsel had the same assessment.”

Presidential pardons of family members are not unheard of. Bill Clinton pardoned his half-brother, Roger Clinton, for drug charges. Jimmy Carter pardoned his brother, Billy Carter, for failing to register as a foreign agent. Benjamin Harrison pardoned his son, Ulysses S. Grant pardoned his brother-in-law, and Andrew Johnson pardoned his son-in-law.

Trump has not been stingy with his use of the unchecked presidential pardon. His included former Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio, fake election conspiracist Dinesh D’Souza, 2016 election conspirators Bernie Kerik, Paul Manafort, Roger Stone, Steve Bannon, and Michael Flynn. Not to mention military officers accused of war crimes, seven members of Congress, Blackwater murderers, Medicare fraudsters.

Then there is Charles Kushner, father of Jared, who pled guilty to assisting in the filing of false tax returns, retaliating against a cooperating witness and making false statements to the Federal Election Commission.

And who Trump named ambassador to France over the weekend.

Did I mention that Jared Kushner failed to receive a security clearance in Trump 1.0 until the FBI was overruled?

Joe Biden, who actually pledged more than once not to intercede, looked at the proposed makeup of the Justice Department and FBI in flip-flopping:

“No reasonable person who looks at the facts of Hunter’s cases can reach any other conclusion than that Hunter was singled out solely because he is my son – and that is wrong,” Biden wrote in a statement explaining his decision. “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.”

That seems to suggest members of the press corps may not be reasonable, saying that the pardon will stiffen the spines of Senate Republicans to back Trump’s choices in tough confirmation hearings over Defense Secretary-designate Pete Hegseth, Health and Human Services Secretary-designate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard or Patel:

It is hard to reconcile this reverence for the machinery of law enforcement with Biden’s decision to exempt his son from the justice they have delivered.

Or that it somehow will make it easier for Trump to follow through on his promise to pardon the insurrectionists who attacked the Capitol on January 6, 2021 to try to overthrow the election? A crime Trump has been accused of but now may skate on because he narrowly won the election.

“Though Biden initially sought to demonstrate his administration’s commitment to higher standards, his latest move only further emboldens a next Trump administration, which will no doubt repeatedly point to this pardon, further weakening the norms of American politics.”

At least Biden didn’t name his son ambassador to France.