SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
Hunter Biden, the son President Joe Biden, attends an event to celebrate the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic teams on the South Lawn of the White House on Monday, September 30, 2024.
(Photo: Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
'I Hope Americans Will Understand': Biden Pardons His Son Hunter
"No reasonable person who looks at the facts of Hunter's cases," said the president, "can reach any other conclusion than Hunter was singled out only because he is my son – and that is wrong."
Dec 01, 2024
President Joe Biden on Sunday evening issued a full and unconditional pardon for his son, Hunter Biden, saying that he was "selectively, and unfairly, prosecuted" for political purposes and because of his relationship to his father.
The charges in Hunter's criminal cases, said Biden in a White House statement, "came about only after several of my political opponents in Congress instigated them to attack me and oppose my election."
According to the statement:
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.
In September of this year, the younger Biden was convicted on three felony tax offenses as well as six misdemeanor violations of the tax code. Earlier in the year, he was found guilty on three felony gun-related charges having to do with how he filled out a gun ownership registration.
Hunter has admitted to struggling with addiction and largely taken responsibility for his actions in those criminal cases, though he fought against the criminal convictions in court.
And so it begins...
Political revenge. Mass deportations. Project 2025. Unfathomable corruption. Attacks on Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. Pardons for insurrectionists. An all-out assault on democracy. Republicans in Congress are scrambling to give Trump broad new powers to strip the tax-exempt status of any nonprofit he doesn’t like by declaring it a “terrorist-supporting organization.” Trump has already begun filing lawsuits against news outlets that criticize him. At Common Dreams, we won’t back down, but we must get ready for whatever Trump and his thugs throw at us. As a people-powered nonprofit news outlet, we cover issues the corporate media never will, but we can only continue with our readers’ support. By donating today, please help us fight the dangers of a second Trump presidency. |
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
President Joe Biden on Sunday evening issued a full and unconditional pardon for his son, Hunter Biden, saying that he was "selectively, and unfairly, prosecuted" for political purposes and because of his relationship to his father.
The charges in Hunter's criminal cases, said Biden in a White House statement, "came about only after several of my political opponents in Congress instigated them to attack me and oppose my election."
According to the statement:
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.
In September of this year, the younger Biden was convicted on three felony tax offenses as well as six misdemeanor violations of the tax code. Earlier in the year, he was found guilty on three felony gun-related charges having to do with how he filled out a gun ownership registration.
Hunter has admitted to struggling with addiction and largely taken responsibility for his actions in those criminal cases, though he fought against the criminal convictions in court.
President Joe Biden on Sunday evening issued a full and unconditional pardon for his son, Hunter Biden, saying that he was "selectively, and unfairly, prosecuted" for political purposes and because of his relationship to his father.
The charges in Hunter's criminal cases, said Biden in a White House statement, "came about only after several of my political opponents in Congress instigated them to attack me and oppose my election."
According to the statement:
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.
In September of this year, the younger Biden was convicted on three felony tax offenses as well as six misdemeanor violations of the tax code. Earlier in the year, he was found guilty on three felony gun-related charges having to do with how he filled out a gun ownership registration.
Hunter has admitted to struggling with addiction and largely taken responsibility for his actions in those criminal cases, though he fought against the criminal convictions in court.
We've had enough. The 1% own and operate the corporate media. They are doing everything they can to defend the status quo, squash dissent and protect the wealthy and the powerful. The Common Dreams media model is different. We cover the news that matters to the 99%. Our mission? To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. How? Nonprofit. Independent. Reader-supported. Free to read. Free to republish. Free to share. With no advertising. No paywalls. No selling of your data. Thousands of small donations fund our newsroom and allow us to continue publishing. Can you chip in? We can't do it without you. Thank you.