President Joe Biden announced yesterday that he is granting his son Hunter Biden a full and unconditional pardon in the two federal criminal cases for which he was scheduled to be sentenced later this month — the Delaware firearm case, and the California tax-evasion case. The pardon also included any offenses he committed during the 10 year and 11 month period between January 1, 2014 and December 1, 2024:
Executive Grant of Clemency
Joseph R. Biden, Jr.
President of the United States of America
To All to Whom These Presents Shall Come, Greeting:
Be It Known, That This Day, I, Joseph R. Biden, Jr., President of the United States, Pursuant to My Powers Under Article II, Section 2, Clause 1, of the Constitution, Have Granted Unto
ROBERT HUNTER BIDEN
A Full and Unconditional Pardon
For those offenses against the United States which he has committed or may have committed or taken part in during the period from January 1, 2014 through December 1, 2024, including but not limited to all offenses charged or prosecuted (including any that have resulted in convictions) by Special Counsel David C. Weiss in Docket No. 1:23-cr-00061-MN in the United States District Court for the District of Delaware and Docket No. 2:23-CR-00599-MCS-1 in the United States District Court for the Central District of California.
IN TESTIMONY WHEREOF I have hereunto signed my name and caused the Pardon to be recorded with the Department of Justice.
Done at the City of Washington this 1st day of December in the year of our Lord Two Thousand and Twenty-four and of the Independence of the United States the Two Hundred and Forty-ninth.
On the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings earlier this year, Biden spoke with ABC News anchor David Muir at the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial in Normandy, France, close to the beachheads where 4,414 allied soldiers were killed on June 6, 1944. During the interview, Muir asked Biden if he is considering pardoning Hunter, stating, “have you ruled out a pardon for your son?” Biden responded, “Yes.”
Politicians React
Colorado Governor Jared Polis, a Democrat, stated he understands Biden’s desire to protect his son, but stated putting family ahead of the country is a bad precedent, and wrote Biden should have maintained that no one should be above the law, stating in a post on X:
While as a father I certainly understand President @JoeBiden ’s natural desire to help his son by pardoning him, I am disappointed that he put his family ahead of the country. This is a bad precedent that could be abused by later Presidents and will sadly tarnish his reputation. When you become President, your role is Pater familias of the nation. Hunter brought the legal trouble he faced on himself, and one can sympathize with his struggles while also acknowledging that no one is above the law, not a President and not a President’s son.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) responded to the pardon, stating Biden’s actions have “almost irreparably damaged” U.S. citizens’ trust in the Department of Justice (DOJ), stating in a post on X:
President Biden insisted many times he would never pardon his own son for his serious crimes. But last night he suddenly granted a “Full and Unconditional Pardon” for any and all offenses that Hunter committed for more than a decade!
Trust in our justice system has been almost irreparably damaged by the Bidens and their use and abuse of it.
Real reform cannot begin soon enough!
Gun Owners of America also responded, noting Biden’s hypocrisy on infringing on U.S. citizens’ gun rights, while exempting Hunter from those laws, stating in a post on X:
Senator Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) remarked that while Americans can sympathize with Biden wanting to pardon his son, there was no excuse for him lying about pardoning Hunter:
In May, 2024, Biden wrote “No one is above the law” in a post on X:
Biden wrote that Hunter was “selectively, and unfairly” prosecuted, and made excuses alleging the crimes he was charged with are “almost never brought to trial.” He continued, stating “Enough is enough” in the White House press release:
Today, I signed a pardon for my son Hunter. From the day I took office, I said I would not interfere with the Justice Department’s decision-making, and I kept my word even as I have watched my son being selectively, and unfairly, prosecuted. Without aggravating factors like use in a crime, multiple purchases, or buying a weapon as a straw purchaser, people are almost never brought to trial on felony charges solely for how they filled out a gun form. Those who were late paying their taxes because of serious addictions, but paid them back subsequently with interest and penalties, are typically given non-criminal resolutions. It is clear that Hunter was treated differently.
The charges in his cases came about only after several of my political opponents in Congress instigated them to attack me and oppose my election. Then, a carefully negotiated plea deal, agreed to by the Department of Justice, unraveled in the court room — with a number of my political opponents in Congress taking credit for bringing political pressure on the process. Had the plea deal held, it would have been a fair, reasonable resolution of Hunter’s cases.
No reasonable person who looks at the facts of Hunter’s cases can reach any other conclusion than 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 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. Enough is enough.
For my entire career I have followed a simple principle: just tell the American people the truth. They’ll be fair-minded. Here’s the truth: I believe in the justice system, but as I have wrestled with this, I also believe raw politics has infected this process and it led to a miscarriage of justice — and once I made this decision this weekend, there was no sense in delaying it further. I hope Americans will understand why a father and a President would come to this decision.
