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“His word is worthless”: by pardoning his son Hunter, Joe Biden provokes indignation and unease

He had repeatedly repeated that he would not do it, but he went back on his word: Joe Biden pardoned his son Hunter, entangled in several legal cases. Enough to provoke indignation among Republicans and unease even in the Democratic camp.

• Also read: Joe Biden pardons his son Hunter in cases of tax fraud and illegal possession of firearms

• Also read: Pardon from Hunter Biden: we condone Trump and encourage cynicism

“No reasonable person looking at the facts in the Hunter cases can come to any conclusion other than this: Hunter was singled out solely because he is my son,” the 82 president said. years in a press release on Sunday.

The Democrat thus announced, a few weeks before Donald Trump’s arrival at the White House, to use his presidential power of pardon to absolve his son Hunter, 54, who was awaiting his sentence in cases of illegal detention of firearms and tax fraud.

According to the spokesperson for the American executive Karine Jean-Pierre, Joe Biden is convinced that his opponents are “trying to make his son break down in order to make him break down.”

“It was not an easy decision to make,” she said Monday aboard Air Force One, which was heading to Angola, where the president is visiting for a few days.

Joe Biden had however stated on several occasions that he would not use this constitutional prerogative for his youngest son. The White House again denied any intention in this direction on November 7.

«Iceberg»

An about-face that Joe Biden’s opponents did not fail to castigate.

“For months, he and his White House spokespeople promised the American people that he would not pardon Hunter Biden,” Republican Senator Tom Cotton recalled on Fox News on Monday.

“We now know that his word is worthless,” he said.

For Republican James Comer, “the accusations Hunter faced were just the tip of the iceberg,” and the president lied “from start to finish about the corrupt influence peddling activities committed by his family.” .

“It is unfortunate that rather than acknowledging their decades of wrongdoing, President Biden and his family continue to do everything they can to avoid accountability,” the influential elected official said on X .

The Democratic president has attracted criticism even in his own camp.

The decision creates “a bad precedent that future presidents could abuse and will unfortunately tarnish his reputation,” the Democratic governor of Colorado, Jared Polis, said on X, saying however he understood the choice of Joe Biden “as a father”.

Democratic elected official Glenn Ivey said for his part he had “mixed feelings” on the issue.

Because even if Joe Biden wanted to protect his son from “unjust” prosecutions, this pardon “will be used against us when we fight against the abuses that come from the Trump administration,” he warned on CNN.

“Abuse”

But in the eyes of Nicholas Creel, professor at Georgia College & State University, if Joe Biden’s decision to pardon his son should prove “politically unpopular”, its impact should remain minimal on the political landscape.

Donald Trump “did not need an excuse” and has already been “abundantly clear, since the presidential election, that he sees his victory as a mandate to do what he wants”, believes the professor to AFP .

The Republican has already suggested that upon his return to the White House on January 20, he would not hesitate to use his prerogatives to pardon all those convicted of the assault on the Capitol in Washington on January 6, 2021. Donald Trump supporters then tried to prevent Congress from certifying Joe Biden’s presidential victory.

The future president also referred to it in a message on Sunday on his Truth Social platform: “Does the pardon granted by Joe to Hunter include the January 6 hostages, who have been imprisoned for years? What abuse and what a miscarriage of justice!”

During his first term, Donald Trump pardoned Charles Kushner, father of his son-in-law Jared, convicted of tax fraud. On Saturday, he announced that he had chosen this former real estate mogul to become United States ambassador to .

Pardoning a family member, a rare decision for an American president

The pardon granted by Joe Biden to his son Hunter constitutes one of the very rare cases in which an American president has exercised this constitutional power for the benefit of a member of his family.

American presidents decree hundreds of pardons or commutations of sentences, with a notable acceleration at the end of their four-year mandate.

But Joe Biden’s ruling in favor of his son before sentencing in two separate cases is only the third in recent American history to benefit a member of the presidential family.

According to the outgoing president, his son, convicted of illegal possession of a firearm and tax evasion, is the victim of “a miscarriage of justice”.

His predecessor and soon-to-be Republican successor Donald Trump also pardoned in December 2020 the father of his son-in-law and advisor Jared Kushner, sentenced in 2004 to two years in prison for tax embezzlement.

“Why didn’t President Biden pardon Hunter last year before appointing him ambassador to ?” jokes Richard Painter, senior legal official at the White House under George W. Bush, on social networks.

The latter’s Democratic predecessor, Bill Clinton, pardoned his half-brother Roger Clinton, convicted of cocaine possession in 1985, in 2001, on the last day of his mandate.

In the case of both Roger Clinton and Charles Kushner, both men had completed their prison sentences by the time they were pardoned.

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