A loving act of mercy from a father who has already experienced much sorrow? Or a hypocritical political maneuver reminiscent of his great enemy? Maybe both can be true.
Joe Biden’s announcement Sunday that he has pardoned his son Hunter, who faces convictions in two criminal cases, is likely the product of a Shakespearean battle between head and heart.
On the one hand, Biden is one of the last major institutionalists in Washington. “From the day I took office, I said I would not interfere with the decision-making of the Department of Justice,” he said in an unusually direct and personal statement on Sunday. Undermining the separation of powers goes against every fiber of his political being.
On the other hand, Biden is nothing without family. His speeches are peppered with references to his parents. As a senator, he once took a train from Washington to Wilmington, Delaware, so he could blow out the candles on his eight-year-old daughter Ashley’s birthday cake at the station and then cross the platform and catch the next train. back to work training.
Related: Joe Biden grants ‘full and unconditional’ pardon to son Hunter
Biden was profoundly shaped by the deaths of his first wife, Neilia Hunter Biden, and 13-month-old daughter Naomi in a car accident and, much later, the death of his son Beau from brain cancer. In that context, Hunter’s status as the first child of a sitting president to face criminal charges may have hurt his father in what Ernest Hemingway called “the broken places.”
Hunter was convicted this summer of lying about his drug use when he bought a gun. Joe Biden categorically ruled out a pardon or commutation for his son, telling reporters: “I stand by the jury’s decision. I will do that and I will not pardon him.” Hunter also pleaded guilty in a separate tax evasion trial and was scheduled to be sentenced in both cases later this month.
Biden reportedly wondered for months what to do. The balance has almost certainly been tipped by Donald Trump’s victory in last month’s presidential election. The prospect of leaving Hunter to the tender mercies of Trump’s undoubtedly politicized, retaliation-driven Justice Department was too much to bear. Biden typically seeks advice from close family and likely came to the decision after talking about it over an intimate Thanksgiving weekend.
“No reasonable person looking at the facts of Hunter’s cases could come to any conclusion other than that Hunter was singled out solely because he is my son — and that is wrong,” the president said in a statement, calling it “a judicial error’. .
He added: “Attempts have been made to break Hunter – who has been sober for five and a half years, even in the face of relentless attacks and selective prosecution. By breaking Hunter, they tried to break me too – and there’s no reason to think it will stop there. Enough is enough.”
Joe Biden’s defenders will surely argue that, had Hunter been an ordinary citizen, the gun case wouldn’t have gotten this far, and that his father simply righted that wrong. Republicans have hyped investigations into Hunter for years, but it turned up no evidence linking his father to corruption.
Eric Holder, former attorney general, wrote on social media that no U.S. attorney “would have charged this case given the underlying facts. After a five-year investigation, the discovered facts only made that clear. If his name had been Joe Smith, the resolution would have been – fundamentally and more honestly – a declination. Apologies warranted.”
It was also noted that this is not the first time that pardons have smacked of nepotism. As president, Bill Clinton pardoned his half-brother on old cocaine charges, and Trump pardoned Jared Kushner’s father, his son-in-law, for tax evasion and retaliation against a cooperating witness, even though in both cases the men had already served their sentences. prison sentences. Trump also used the dog days of his first presidency to pardon the rogues’ gallery of Steve Bannon, Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort and Roger Stone.
And yet, for many Americans, there will be something shocking about the double standard of a president pardoning a member of his own family ahead of countless other worthwhile matters. Republicans in the House of Representatives, of course, railed with more exaggeration about the “Biden crime family.”
But there were also more thoughtful objections. Jared Polis, the Democratic governor of Colorado, wrote on social media: “While as a father I certainly understand President Joe Biden’s natural desire to help his son by pardoning him, I am disappointed that he has put family over country stated. This is a bad precedent that could be abused by future presidents and will unfortunately tarnish his reputation.”
Joe Walsh, a former Republican congressman turned Trump critic, said on the MSNBC network: “Joe Biden repeatedly said he wouldn’t do this, so he lied repeatedly. This only furthers the cynicism that people have about politics and that cynicism strengthens Trump because Trump can say, ‘I’m not a unique threat. Everyone does this. If I do something for my child, my son-in-law, anything, look, Joe Biden is doing the same thing.” I understand, but this was a selfish move by Biden, which only makes Trump stronger politically. It just deflates.”
The Trump context is impossible to ignore in this moral maze. Next month he will become the first convicted criminal to be sworn in as president, although three cases against him have all but been dismissed. He’s already appointing loyalists to the FBI and Justice Department.
Michelle Obama once advised: When they go low, we go high. On Sunday, Joe Biden, 82 and heading for the exit with little to lose, decided to go low. Maybe it was what any parent would have done.
