President Joe Biden pardoned his son, Hunter, on Sunday night, sparing the younger Biden a possible prison sentence for federal felony gun and tax convictions and reversing his past promises not to use the extraordinary powers of the presidency for the benefit of his family.
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00:00President Joe Biden has pardoned his son Hunter following convictions on tax and gun charges.
00:07This is an announcement that wipes the slate clean and ensures that Hunter Biden will not
00:12be incarcerated as he prepares for sentencing.
00:15What's really notable here is this is an action that the White House had repeatedly said over
00:19the course of many weeks that the president did not intend to take.
00:22However, in a statement that he has issued, President Biden has said that in looking at
00:27the facts of the case, he had concluded that Hunter Biden was singled out in quote, a miscarriage
00:32of justice and was prosecuted because he was the president's son.
00:37And so he has determined that the case cases were unfair and that Hunter Biden deserved
00:42credit for having turned his life around in the year since the conduct occurred.
00:47And so it's really notable that he's taking this action now to to really help his son
00:51benefit his son and undo two separate criminal cases that really shattered his son for the
00:57last several years.
00:58In this case, the pardons came not only in the final weeks of President Biden's tenure,
01:03but also in the days before Hunter Biden was to be sentenced.
01:08You'll remember he was convicted in a gun case in Delaware and pleaded guilty in a separate
01:13tax case in California.
01:15He was set to learn his fate and prosecutors were set to, you know, try to seek to have
01:23a sentence imposed on him.
01:25And so this pardon really averts that punishment, ensures that he won't be faced with an incarceration.
01:35And so this the pardon does seem designed to preempt that next step in the criminal
01:41process.
01:42But it is also the case that it is not the first time that a president has deployed his
01:46pardon power to benefit those around him.
01:49You'll remember, of course, that in December 2020, then-President Donald Trump pardoned
01:55the father of his son-in-law, so he pardoned Charles Kushner, whose son Jared is married
02:00to Trump's daughter Ivanka.
02:03And that that raised attention.
02:04He also pardoned multiple close allies who were convicted in special counsel Robert Mueller's
02:09Russia investigation.
02:10So there is a precedent for presidents taking pardon power to benefit, you know, family
02:17members, people close to them.
02:19But there's no question that in doing this, President Biden is probably setting himself
02:23up for questions into the days ahead.