ABOARD AIR FORCE ONE (AP) — The White House is not ruling out a possible commutation for Hunter Biden, the president’s son who was convicted of three federal gun crimes.
“As we all know, the sentencing has not even been scheduled yet,” White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters on Air Force One on Wednesday. President Joe Biden traveled to the top of the Group of Seven in Italy.
She said she has not spoken to the president about the matter since the verdict was handed down on Tuesday.
During an ABC News interview last week, Biden definitively ruled out pardoning his son.
“He was very clear, very candid, obviously very definitive,” Jean-Pierre said of the president’s comments about a possible pardon policy. But as for a buyout, “I just don’t have anything else.”
A pardon is an expression of forgiveness for a criminal offense that restores certain rights, such as voting, that a person loses upon conviction. Meanwhile, a commutation reduces a sentence but leaves the conviction intact.
The White House position differs from what it said in September, when Jean-Pierre was asked whether the president would “pardon or commute his son if convicted.” The press secretary responded at the time: “I have answered this question before. I was asked this not too long ago, a few weeks ago. And I was very clear and said no.”
Hunter Biden was convicted of lying on a mandatory gun purchase form by saying he was not illegally using or addicted to drugs and that he had the gun illegally in his possession for 11 days.
The three charges carry a maximum prison sentence of 25 years. But whether the president’s son is actually behind bars depends on U.S. District Judge Maryellen Noreika. The judge, who was nominated to the court by former Republican President Donald Trump, did not immediately set a sentencing date.
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Associated Press writer Seung Min Kim in Washington contributed to this report.
