Summary
President Joe Biden pardoned his son Hunter Biden, prompting strong backlash from Republicans.
GOP lawmakers criticized the move as an abuse of power and an attempt to avoid accountability, with figures like Rep. James Comer and Sen. Chuck Grassley calling it hypocritical and corrupt.
Biden defended the pardon, citing “selective prosecution” and claiming Hunter was unfairly targeted due to their family connection.
Hunter faced convictions for federal gun and tax charges.
Well, y’all mfuckers put a convicted felon, a rapist, a fraudster and a con artist as your president, so shut the fuck up.
You forgot the worst one, which is “fascist wanna-be dictator.”
“Wanna-be” is no longer needed.
He is a fascist dictator.
To them : god king emperor
Theres still state governments in the way, he’d need to kill off state governments in order to actually be a dictator.
That’s what dictators do.
And the worst part, these are all the same person!
I’m not pleased at the prospect of Republicans doing the same thing in four years, after the corruption of Trump’s second term, and then pointing their fingers at this… but, to anyone with half a brain and at least one eye… Hunter wasn’t in politics, wasn’t directly appointed to his staff or a representative in any fashion within the White House, and the gun and tax crimes are small fries compared to anything the Trump family and stooges are or have been up to.
Prospect? Trump handed out pardons like candy to far worse people who happened to aligned with his politics. After 8 years of seeing Trump rat-fuck norms and laws and precedent and unjustly go after his family and get away with everything, while everyone else tries to play by the rules, Biden is probably asking himself why he has to let his son risk prison when he knows everyone in the incoming administration wouldn’t even give a second thought to pardoning.
I don’t support it, but I get it. This is the kind of shit America voted for, right?
Haven’t seen this linked yet so I’ll leave it here: https://www.justice.gov/pardon/pardons-granted-president-joseph-biden-2021-present - (25 pardons, 26 pardons including Hunter) https://www.justice.gov/pardon/pardons-granted-president-donald-j-trump-2017-2021 - (144 pardons)
(Got distracted counting Trumps pardons, may be off by a few)
Yeah the choice for President was between cop and felon. The majority polled against equal application of the rule of law. Biden is just respecting the voters’ wishes.
Roger Stone, Steve Banon, Dinesh D’Souza all sorts of other crony based pardons were already done in Trumps last term.
Your Pearl Clutching the inevitable (as of it will now be Bidens fault) is ridiculous, and out of line.
Ooof, you went from my comment being just slightly irritated that he did it when he could have not done it and better served the Democratic Party by keeping his hands out of and showing that the Dems can do and be better, just a small gripe but that I understand anyway… to blasting me for ‘pearl clutching’? Ok, I guess.
The Democrats can be better sure. But no one cares unfortunately. They re elected someone far worse.
Worse, Republicans were already hypocritically obsessed with Hunter. With them preparing to fascisticaly weaponize the DOJ. He would have been one of the first and worst targeted by them. I don’t blame or hold pardoning him against Joe Biden. It won’t stop the fascists ultimately. But it will make him less of an easy target.
Democrats spent the last 4 years worrying about optics. And they have nothing to show for it.
Democrats spent the last 4 years worrying about optics. And they have nothing to show for it.
And even if “optics” was super important, this is going to have zero optical effect. Some frankly bizarre pearl clutching now, but no elections are coming and only total fucking morons think this is somehow going to ease Trump doing worse things. No one is going to give a single shit in two or four years when Trump is pardoning Jared Kushner for personally helping Mohammed bin Salman torture and murder some dissidents.
I’m fuckin glad he did it.
I want to see more. We put all our hope into this party and they have yet to even throw a punch. Make a mistake so big it forces the political climate to shift, please already.
Nobody cares if the “Dems should and could be better than the GOP”… We literally are demanding our Dem reps fight against this for us, and thus far, they refused. And still do. This is Biden just looking after Biden, which, frankly, is par for the course in US politics.
Lololol no.
Prospect? Where have you been? Did you miss when Trump pardoned Jared Kushner’s father?
Prosecutors alleged that after Charles Kushner [Jared Kushner’s father] discovered his brother-in-law was cooperating with federal authorities in an investigation, he hatched a scheme for revenge and intimidation.
Kushner hired a prostitute to lure his brother-in-law, then arranged to have the encounter in a New Jersey motel room recorded with a hidden camera and the recording sent to his own sister, the man’s wife, prosecutors said.
In fact, this man who “pleaded guilty to 18 counts including tax evasion and witness tampering” has now been nominated to be Ambassador to France by Trump. There is no “prospect of Republicans doing the same thing in four years.” They’ve been doing it for the last 40+ years already. You just haven’t been paying attention.
It’s about time the Democrats got of their damn high horse and got down in the mud and started fighting like they mean it.
Don Jr did cocaine in public at the recent Space X launch and not a peep out of the mainstream media, much less police.
If a policeman saw a black man outside a night club do what Don Jr did, he would have been arrested on the spot and immediately thrown in jail.
There’s no disagreement from me, before you made this comment or after.
Did you forget Trump pardoning several war criminals and others in his cabinet who directly worked with foreign adverse governments?
No, but America did and America will forget again. The only thing that matters is the freshest thing their opponent did, the one that gets the most media, and my small gripe about this, which should barely be an issue to begin with, is that the Republicans will blow it out of proportions and use it to excuse themselves for corruption and treason.
It’s a gripe. I understand why he did it. I understand the last guy did worse. But, I still reserve the right to complain a little.
that the Republicans will blow it out of proportions and use it to excuse themselves for corruption and treason.
They will do this regardless of what their opponent does.
The Reich Wingers never needed an excuse for corruption so far. What makes you think they need one now?
Sure, they’ll be corrupt. I even said that they’d do it anyway, but now this is another thing they can point to this when they do it. Whatever, right?
I still don’t like that he did this, especially after years and months of him saying he wouldn’t. And he didn’t do a good enough job of showing us why it was important that he change his might right now and go against the justice system he said to trust in before. Is there new evidence that he could share that gives us reason to believe it wasn’t impartial, more than what news has been reporting for ages now? Everyone knows it was the ‘(Hunter) Biden witch hunt!’ for years, and yet he stood up and said that he wouldn’t interfere, that he was better than Trump and Klan. That Democrats stand by the rule of law, etc, and etc. Now what do all those words he said mean?
Again, I understand why I might be a little worried. And I understand why someone might want to use what power is rightfully given to them and that cannot be undone to protect their recovering son from living in the prison system while under the regime of your family enemy, sure. But, I reserve the right to be peeved about him doing it. Especially after years of him and the entire party talking about Law and Order.
And everyone getting upset about Trump’s threats to pardon the J6ers. When he does, what’s everyone going to say?
- “Well, it’s within his power. Oh, well. Guess that’s the end of J6, it was a nothingburger anyway.”,
- “Look at the obvious corruption, pardoning these guys because they were his stooges in his attempted coup!”,
- or “it was a politically motivated witch hunt, anyway, the democrats weaponized the DOJ to go after these peaceful protestors!”
🤷♂️
The fact you’d compare Hunter’s case that was wholly nonviolent, to an attempted violent coup makes me wonder if you’re just sealioning here…
No. It is not wrong to feel negatively toward a Hunter Biden pardon. And to criticize people for feeling that way, and refusing to listen to them when they give you plenty of reasons why they could feel bad about it, is ridiculous. That’s all I’m saying. I mentioned in other comments that Hunter’s case here, or two trials, amount to nothing compared to other criminals in the Trump family and Klan. But, I’m getting grief for my feelings, which is personal to me and I’ve provided multiple reasons why I could or would feel this way, because other people feel differently than me bout it. Ok! That’s fine. Go feel differently and rave about high horse shit. Idc! I just want the commenters who are browbeating me about personally feeling a little peeved bout the guy changing his stance, and about how I rightfully pointed out, multiple times and in many different ways, that the other ‘team’ will point to this pardon (no matter how unbalanced a comparison) when they pardon the J6ers!
There’s no trolling here! I just didn’t like that he did it. And I’m saying that the guys who play in bad faith, anyway, will point to this when they do it. Not that that matters, sure, and especially since the majority of the commenters are saying as much. But, the Klan will anyway.
Edit: good grief, people just get hung up and dig in… over and over. I just want to not feel happy that he did it and I want for people to be allowed to feel that way. And I want those that are alright with it happening to remember that we shouldn’t like Nepotism hiring or pardons, and we got onto the other team for doing it before! And we’ll do it again, probably in the next few months!
Sigh.
The Reich Wingers already did this exact thing, in Trump’s last term.
whataboutism
And those “small fries” were illegally buying a firearm and skirting $1,400,000 in federal taxes.
And I thought we were the guys who wanted stronger gun control and the rich to pay their taxes?? Does that go out the window when it’s one of “ours”?
I’m not saying I agree with the decision, but as Biden, would you really want your son somewhere Trump could immediately fuck with him as soon as he wanted? Had Kamala won this would absolutely be a dumbass decision. With Trump incoming… I get it.
Who cares about what happens to Hunter “10% for The Big Guy” Biden? Maybe I’m just some poor peon who doesn’t understand how the ultra-wealthy are, but “lying during a gun purchase and not paying $1,400,000 in federal taxes” seem like pretty avoidable crimes to me.
This is such an awful thing for Biden to do. The “both sides” folk are going to have a time with this for the next four years and they’ll be absolutely right in this case.
“10% for the big guy”
With that one phrase you’ve gone FULL mask off lmao. You are the epitome of “both sides r the same”.
Yep that’s a mask off to reveal the trumptard face moment. Trump supporters are garbage and we will remember who is one for quite some time.
Personally I’m boycotting any business with visible Trump support, and I make it a point to tell their staff that I won’t be back and the reason why. Last time I had to do this I told them their Trump shit was fucking disgusting and I would never be back.
I’m of the, apparently wildly fascistic, opinion that vice presidents’ sons shouldn’t sell off their father’s influence to foreign nationals.
But Trump placing his son in law, sons, and daughter into White House positions and using their fathers influence to obtain backroom deals with the Chinese government (ivanka) and securing a $3 billion loan from the Saudi royal family (Jared Kushner) is different right? 🤡
The problem with you and other ghouls like you is that your game doesn’t work when talking to people who have paid attention to events in the last 8 years. Not everyone is as willing to suspend facts as you are.
Absolutely right?
Dems did it once, Republicans live in this shit.
See: “whataboutism”
Based on how those crimes have been enforced, yes. The federal gun charge that says a drug addict cannot own a gun is rarely enforced historically and is being challenged in the courts by Republicans because the DOJ started using it against white supremacists. Yet Hunter Biden wasn’t even allowed a plea deal because of the politics around him. As for the taxes, when he was caught, he paid them and the fines associated with them. For literally anyone else caught doing the same, that is the end of it. No jail time or further penalties.
Joe Biden tried to let the courts do their job and trusted that the courts would be fair. They weren’t. This was clearly a political prosecution and I would have done the same in (Joe) Biden’s shoes.
The federal gun charge that says a drug addict cannot own a gun is rarely enforced historically
And yet it’s still a felony. I thought we were the ones who support strong gun regulation?
wasn’t even allowed a plea deal
No one is entitled to a plea deal. For the severity of Hunter’s crimes, I’m fine with it.
As for the taxes, when he was caught, he paid them
Keyphrase: “When he was caught.” He was just fine stealing the $1.4m from Americans otherwise.
Joe Biden tried to let the courts do their job and trusted that the courts would be fair. They weren’t.
That’s not how it works and you know this is going to literally be Trump’s argument on Day One when he starts pardoning his supporters, right?
“the severity of hunters crimes”
I fucking loled
I thought we were the ones who support strong gun regulation?
Who is “we”? I want all of the working class to be armed.
“Under no pretext shall arms and ammunition be surrendered, and any attempt to do so should be frustrated, by force, if necessary” - Karl Marx
“The rifle on the wall of the workingman’s cottage is proof liberty exists. Our job is to ensure it remains.” - George Orwell
(I may have butchered the quotes a bit, but the meaning is intact)
Compared to the shit Flynn, Manafort, Stone, etc were doing? Yeah, small fry.
“Illegally buying a firearm”… My brother in christ, I literally know 10 people who did the exact same thing, because cannabis is legal in my state, and they lied on the 4473 to pass the background check.
These two posts on my front page right beside each other.
Get fucked Republicans. You have no moral high ground here.
I think Biden should use his pardon power for good. I don’t have a huge problem with this, but I want him to do something unexpected. Biden should pardon all the married immigrants after his program was recently shot down in court. For those that don’t know, Many immigrants are married to US citizens, but cannot achieve citizenship that you normally would be able to do. It hinges on entering the country Illegally, which requires them to leave for up to 10 years before re applying for citizenship. Biden could pardon the “crime” of illegal entry, this removing the INS statue of not allowing them citizenship.
See the problem with that is. While the president can try to pardon unlawful entry, unlawful entry is a civil offense, meaning, you aren’t even entitled to a court appointed lawyer. So the supreme court might try to weigh in on pardons for civil offenses.
But even if the pardon is all legit and pass the supreme court, it doesn’t matter, in immigration law, all arrests, all convictions, any juvenile proceeding within the past 5 years, are all visible to USCIS and they are legally allowed to consider them when determining whether or not to allow someone to enter the US, whether or not to deport them, or whether or not to allow adjustment of legal status. Yes ALL records, even pardoned, even if sealed or expunged by court, they see everything. You can visit the USCIS website and see for yourself.
Edit: And oh, even if you are never arrested, but the FBI investigated you a few times, USCIS might have access to those and if the FBI agents wrote bad things on your file, you might have problems with immigration or naturalization. Yea its quite fucked up, but it is what it is.
Everyone needs to play the same game they do.
Is it hypocritical, yeah probably, does he have any reason to answer for it? Naw
Trump just put Kusher in a role … a person he pardoned for … “preparing false tax returns, witness retaliation, and making false statements to the FEC” per his own statement.
Right.
People voted this kind of behavior into office, repeatedly. Anyone clutching pearls right now can fuck off.
I sure as hell wouldn’t want my son at the mercy of Trumps DOJ.
Right?
Americans don’t get to complain about corruption anymore. We gleefully voted for corruption after it was shown to us in pretty much the most blatant way possible and given to us as a choice going forward.
It’s who we are now and we voted for it. Complaints will not be forwarded to management.
If you think that Trump’s DOJ is gonna respect pardons from a Democrat…
They’ll absolutely respect them as long as Trump Daddy is still selling them.
Who fucking cares. trump did far worse and kushner walked away with a couple billion and not one person in the government or media batted an eyelash. We’re in a post factual society.
Exactly. Honestly all the self-flagellation, finger wagging and purity tests over this are exactly why the Democrats have lost and the Republicans took power over the entire government.
Trump gave his son-in-law’s daddy a pardon for crimes that included trying to blackmail a witness against him in a criminal case by hiring a prostitute and recording their sex.
Trump pardoned the murderers responsible for a massacre in Iraq.
Trump pardoned Manafort and Stone and others who committed crimes to get Trump into office.
The majority of Trump’s pardons were people who are personally or politically connected to him. I guarantee we’ll see far worse in Trump’s next term no matter what Biden does.
So yeah Biden can and should pardon whoever the fuck he wants, especially to those people Trump has threatened retaliation.
Well said friend.
So two wrongs make a right I guess? Why shouldn’t we be holding all these people accountable?
In this specific case, because the hunter biden thing was political bullshit from the start. secondly though, the wrongs in question are nowhere near close to each other. third, hunters “crimes” were the typical presidential failson exploits I frankly don’t care that he excuses, perk of the job as far as I’m concerned. Getting your loser kid off the hook for drug and gun charges you know, not a coverup of the murder of a journalist for the bargain price of 2 billion dollars.
I seriously think he should do a LOT of other shitty things Trump set the precedent for. Like perhaps seriously abuse that presidential pardon thing that Trump invented.
Like, I don’t know, I’m just brainstorming here, perhaps order the assassinations of the future president and all of the key people circling around him. And then just go all Jesse Pinkman, “yeah! presidential immunity bitch!”.
What do you mean by the presidential pardon thing that Trump invented?
EDIT: Also it really scares me how freely people discuss murder on Lemmy. Not just from a moral standpoint but also for you. I hope people consider the seriousness of these comments and that these comments can be used against you.
Literally, no sane person would care if Trump was killed for his crimes against the people of the US, or crimes against the people of the globe.
War sucks, and people die. He chose to wage war on the working class.
A lot of people would care. At least around 70 million at last count.
And, for this discussion, they don’t count. They would be mad at whatever Donald told them to mad about. Even if it’s just the two minute hate.
So you’re going to kill Donald Trump and tell 70 million people they aren’t allowed to be angry?
Good luck.
Never said kill all the MAGATts. I said they don’t count in the “outrage” performance.
You said nobody would care if Trump was killed and then said his voters don’t matter. That’s a bit ridiculous.
I’m just saying that it scares me that we are all being pushed to the extremes; that I’m worried about what that means for us as a society. I’m also just trying to point out that these kinds of comments could be used against you, especially with someone in charge that has talked about going after his enemies.
It doesn’t matter if it can be used against an enemy of Trump’s.
Even if it was never said, Trump will just make something up.
And if you are worried now… perhaps ypu should have listened to people sounding the alarms about it in 2007. Now, we are just reaching the end of the empire.
What do you mean by the presidential pardon thing that Trump invented?
“On July 1, 2024, the Court ruled in a 6–3 decision that presidents have absolute immunity for acts committed as president within their core constitutional purview, at least presumptive immunity for official acts within the outer perimeter of their official responsibility, and no immunity for unofficial acts”
You should also note how apparently all criminal cases against Trump were dropped when it became clear that he’s the next president, for instance https://www.forbes.com/sites/alisondurkee/2024/11/26/how-all-of-trumps-criminal-cases-fell-apart-as-jack-smith-drops-federal-charges/
Thanks for the detailed response! I thought it might be that supreme court decision but I wasn’t sure if I missed some other skullduggery.
Fuck 'em. Let them fume. This is the party that wants to let the terrorists from Jan 6 off with a pardon. The party that thinks donvict can do no wrong.
I’ll bet the Jan 6 pardons are quietly forgotten. They were a bunch of useful idiots who have already played their role and can be safely disposed of.
Only exception might be anyone who could be potentially squeezed for more information that might lead to more evidence against Trump, but even that’s probably a non-issue for him.
Free pardons for joining Trump Force, the Premier Private Deportation Group.
Offer only applicable to people with violent felony convictions or Jan 6th related charges
Yeah, I wouldn’t be surprised if he didn’t pardon them.
Not only does he have a history of throwing basically everyone in the universe under the bus, but it’s his second term. He doesn’t have to please anyone now.
The only people allowed to be outraged on this are Democrats. The Republican party lost their right to be angry about this kinda stupid stuff shortly after they elected a rapist.
… and someone who did the exact same thing.
I’d argue he pardoned way worse people.
In a perfect world I’d say he needs to let the system work and nobody is above the law, yada yada yada. Clearly this world and country are horribly fucked. For YEARS Republicans have been using the term “Biden Family” to make them sound like some kind of crime syndicate, coming up with “ominous facts” that were not indicative of any actual crime, held an impeachment over President Bidens head for years, distributed naked pictures of Hunter, and interfered with what would’ve been a simple plea deal, all the while trying to downplay the most corrupt presidency in our history.
Fuck the norms. Fuck ethics. Fuck propriety. The new America requires you to use every tool at your disposal just to get your most basic fucking rights. If Republicans think this is such an abuse of power they can do their fucking jobs for once in their lives and pass some fucking ethics reform. I applaud Joe’s embrace of the new normal and I hope other Democrats figure out this is the new normal, whether they like it or not, and stop playing pussyfoot with a party that’s been playing “kick the groin” for over 30 years.
Biden had all the justification he needed when Trump indicated he’d target his political opponents if he won.
Anyone complaining about this can fuck off.
He should pardon himself for everything before he leaves office so Maga can’t drum up some stupid made up thing to tie up his last years.
Or resign so Kamala can in the last day if he can’t.
Use trumps political retribution statement as the reason.
Or resign so Kamala can in the last day if he can’t.
I want to see that just so all that 45+47 stuff refers to Kamala
He should pardon himself for everything before he leaves office
He doesn’t need to. Presidents have immunity for “official acts”. Womp womp.
I’d say he should and then when the courts rule he can’t, Trump’s self pardon won’t work either but that’s a pipe dream.
But bidens crime was being born, and there’s no statute of limitations on that one!
Gotta be honest. That’s just a really silly thing to say.
Yup. I’d do the same.
Republicans are faux angry. They clearly don’t really care about the deed at all. If anything they’re gleeful because they get to run around and call Biden a nepotistic liar.
Some Democrats are angry because Biden just handed the Republican a stinky turd that they’re going to throw in our face every time someone brings up any of their lies or nepotism.
Many Democrats don’t seem to care either, as long as Trump is worse.
deleted by creator
a stinky turd that they’re going to throw in our face every time someone brings up any of their lies or nepotism.
They already had the stinky turd and were going to throw it anyway. They have many stinky turds. Much throwing!
Good. Fuckem. I’d be pissed about it, too, if we had something resembling justice in this country. Let them have aneurysms.
Words have proven futile. If Dems don’t play the same game Republicans play we WILL lose this democracy.
Democracy has already been lost if every party has to play that game
This isn’t even “the game”. It’s not getting Democrats anything, but it’s also incredibly irrelevant and no one can credibly clutch pearls about abusing pardon powers when it’s basically been a get out of jail free card for big donors for years. It’s already broken and corrupt, and Hunter doesn’t even rank anywhere close to the previous ghouls that have been pardoned, including by the guy who’s succeeding Biden. Never mind Republicans who have been 100x worse, this isn’t even remotely as bad as Clinton’s pardons.
Cool, so pardon someone besides your own son Joe. You can dress it up in flowery speech if you want but until this supposed willingness to play dirty leads to improvements in someone else’s life this is just more of the same bullshit. He’s not helping America with this action he’s helping himself. That’s not noble at all.
He already has one dead son, so I doubt he’s in the mood to offer another as a sacrifice to the MAGAs
Agree that this looks and feels bad, but Hunter was overly scrutinized and punished for his crimes. He already paid his due and was the victim of a real witch hunt. If Trump was pardoning Don Jr I’d be pissed (depending on the crimes I suppose, let DonnyJ do some drugs), but that would be different because Hunter was never involved in politics, held public office or government positions, etc.
I don’t care what his reasoning is. We elected him to protect democracy from Trump and this is perhaps the most obvious example that he’s always been more interested in protecting him and his friends than the rest of us. We all know what’s coming in 6 weeks and look at our supposed protector’s most significant action since the election, handing out a pardon to his own family just like Trump did. Thanks Joe, I’m sure we’ll all sleep better over the next 4 years knowing you dealt with Hunter’s problems instead of ours.
“Nothing will fundamentally change.”
Democracy has already been lost. Turning into mindless beasts won’t bring it back. Neoliberals have voted for the lesser evil so many times that they’re cheering for blatant political corruption, why would you expect them to want a return to democracy? They just want a dictatorship with “their guy” in charge.
Conveniently forgetting the fact Trump has literally thousands of pardons lined up for when he gets back in office
How does that saying go? Something like “if they didn’t have double standards they’d have no standards at all”
I’m surprised Republicans can even remember what a moral high ground looks like let alone pretend to hold it. According to them attempted insurrection, rape, grifting, child sex trafficking, taking away citizens rights on religious grounds, nepotism in high ranking government roles bypassing security screening, soliciting other countries for election interference, abandoning foreign allies, attempting to undermine elections, pardoning murderers, denying election results, etc are all legal and morally okay for people to commit with no restitution for victims or consequences for perpetrators.
I would have felt better if Biden was more honest about this. “Yes, this is a blatant abuse of my power, and shouldn’t be allowed, but it is squarely within my Official Duties. The Supreme Court says that the only remedy is impeachment. Hey, Mike, I double-dog dare ya to do it!”
