Republicans called President Joe Biden a “liar” for pardoning his son, who was convicted this summer on gun charges and pleaded guilty to tax fraud.
The decision comes after the president said in an interview that he would “abide by the jury’s decision” ahead of his son’s conviction in June, when Biden was still at the top of the Democratic ticket.
“Joe Biden has lied from start to finish,” House Oversight Chairman James Comer said in a post on continue to do everything we can to avoid liability.”
The Kentucky Republican was one of the chairmen of the months-long impeachment inquiry focused on business deals made by Hunter Biden and other family members.
Senator John Barrasso, the number three Republican in the Senate and a newcomer to the Republican Party, said in a message on
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) called Biden’s pardon request a “confession that Hunter is a criminal.”
And Texas Republicans were furious. Representative Ronny Jackson called the Bidens “SHAMEFUL LIARS!!” in his post, and Rep. Wesley Hunt said, “Joe Biden simply did what he told us he would never do: GONE his son for crimes he and the majority of the media told us he never committed.”
Democrats, meanwhile, defended the president’s decision.
Former Attorney General Eric Holder, who served under former President Barack Obama, called the pardon “justified” and said, “No USAtty would have prosecuted this case given the underlying facts.”
And Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), one of the impeachment managers against newly elected President Donald Trump, told CNN earlier in the day that any possibility of a pardon for Hunter Biden could be rooted in challenging the case itself. .
“There’s a defense called selective prosecution, if you can show that the government has a series of cases that all look similar, but they pick one person to prosecute based on, for example, political animus toward the person, which in pointed out the claim that Donald Trump has made about why he was targeted,” Raskin said, indicating that Hunter Biden may have been targeted because of his relationship with the president. “The president has the power to show mercy to people who have committed crimes and suffered injustice in some way, or the punishment is disproportionate.”
Not all Democrats were willing to support the president’s Sunday action. Rep. Greg Stanton (D-Ariz.) spoke out against the pardon, saying, “I respect President Biden, but I think he got this wrong.” The former Phoenix mayor continued, “This was not a politically motivated prosecution. Hunter committed crimes and was convicted by a jury of his peers.
Colorado Governor Jared Polis said he sympathized with the president’s “natural desire to help his son” by pardoning him, but added: “I am disappointed that he has put his family before country. This is a bad precedent that could be abused by future presidents and will unfortunately tarnish his reputation.”
Before his father’s pardon, Hunter Biden was criminally convicted in two separate cases, the first of which was set to take place on December 12 in Delaware on gun charges. He was also convicted by a California judge in the tax case on December 16. In that case, he pleaded guilty to failing to pay $1.4 million in taxes over several years.
Jordain Carney and Nicholas Wu contributed to this report.
