Hunter Biden joins the long list of controversial presidential pardons

President Joe Biden’s pardon of his son Hunter on Sunday evening joins the list of controversial presidential pardons issued in the country’s history

The president said the gun and tax charges against his son were politicized, while his son issued his own statement saying he was a drug addict at the time and has since gotten sober. The pardon covers not only the two cases, but also all potential criminal activity between January 1, 2014 and December 1, 2024.

Some members of Biden’s own party were critical of the decision on Sunday and Monday, suggesting it could set an unusual precedent for future presidents.

Ford pardons Nixon

On September 8, 1974, President Gerald R. Ford fully pardoned his predecessor, President Richard Nixon, for any crimes he may have committed against the United States during his time in office. This pardon came about a month after Nixon resigned as president in August 1974.

The pardon concerned Nixon’s activities during the Watergate scandal.

Ford said in a televised statement at the time that pardoning his predecessor was in the best interest of the country.

“It could go on forever, or someone has to write the ending. I’ve come to the conclusion that only I can do this, and if I can, I must,” he said, referring to the Nixon investigation.

Clinton pardons Marc Rich and his half-brother

Biden’s move to grant clemency to a family member is not without precedent. In 2001, at the very end of his term, President Bill Clinton pardoned his half-brother Roger Clinton, who was sentenced to about a year in prison after pleading guilty to selling cocaine to an undercover agent.

On the same day, Clinton also pardoned commodities trader Marc Rich, who fled the United States to Switzerland after being indicted in 1983 for millions of dollars in tax evasion. Rich was also accused of allegedly trading with Iran while the regime held American hostages in the late 1970s.

The former president’s “truly remarkable achievement,” according to a 2001 Brookings Institution article, was “creating a consensus against himself by pardoning Marc Rich, popularly known as the ‘fugitive financier.’

At the time, according to the Brookings Institute, members of Clinton’s own Democratic Party were outraged by Rich’s pardon.

“It was a real betrayal by Bill Clinton of everyone who had strongly supported him to do something so unwarranted. “It was despicable,” former Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) told reporters in 2001.

Carter pardons Vietnam Draft Dodgers

President Jimmy Carter is known for several controversial pardons during his term as president, including blanket pardons for those who had evaded the draft during the Vietnam War. Carter issued the pardon on his first day in office, January 20, 1977, fulfilling his campaign promise.

The move was met with considerable criticism at the time.

Sen. Barry Goldwater (R-Arizona), a Vietnam War supporter and former presidential candidate, said Carter’s move was “the most disgraceful thing a president has ever done.”

Carter’s decision was not entirely unheard of, however. In 1947, President Harry S. Truman granted amnesty to more than 1,500 men who had violated the Selective Training and Service Act of 1940 by not serving in the U.S. military during World War II.

Andrew Johnson pardons Confederate President Jefferson Davis

After the Civil War, President Andrew Johnson issued several proclamations pardoning several former Confederate soldiers. On Christmas Day 1868, Johnson granted Pardons and amnesty for treason for “any person who took part, directly or indirectly, in the recent insurrection or rebellion.”

Johnson, who issued more than 13,000 pardons during his single term in office, reasoned that his executive actions would “provide lasting peace, order and prosperity throughout the country and renew and fully restore confidence and brotherly feeling among the whole people.”

According to federal records, this also included a comprehensive pardon for former Confederate President Jefferson Davis.

Although it was not technically a pardon, more than 100 years later in October 1978, President Carter signed a congressional bill restoring Davis’ civil rights.

Clinton pardons Patty Hearst and Susan Rosenberg

In 1979, Carter commuted the sentence of heiress Patty Hearst for allegedly assisting in a bank robbery after she was kidnapped by the Marxist Symbionese Liberation Army terrorist organization. But more than 20 years later, Clinton gave Hearst a full pardon on his final day in 2001.

Perhaps more controversial was his pardon of Susan Rosenberg and Linda Evans, who were members of a Marxist organization called M19 that had ties to the Weather Underground. Both were convicted of explosives and weapons offenses and had each served about 16 years in prison when Clinton took action.

Her group, described in a book by William Rosenau as “America’s first female terrorist group,” was accused of bombing and damaging the U.S. Capitol.

George HW Bush pardons Iran-Contra convicts

President George H. W. Bush, who served from 1989 to 1993, was criticized for pardoning and commuting the sentences of six people involved in the Iran-Contra scandal during the administration of President Ronald Reagan, when Bush was vice president. had been convicted.

Among those who received pardons were then-Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger and then-White House National Security Advisor Robert McFarlane.

Bush said the pardons came because of what he called a “deeply troubling development in our country’s political and legal climate: the criminalization of political differences.”

“These disparities should be addressed at the policy level, without the sword of Damocles of criminality hanging over the heads of combatants,” he said.

Trump pardons advisers and employees

At the end of his first term, President Donald Trump pardoned his former campaign manager Paul Manafort, his adviser Roger Stone, former national security adviser Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, his former adviser Stephen Bannon and his former adviser George Papadopoulos.

The moves sparked significant backlash in the media and among Democratic lawmakers.

In 2020, Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) and former Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) issued a joint statement claiming that “no other president has exercised the power of clemency for one so obviously personal and self-serving “” with his pardon of Stone.

According to a White House statement released at the time, Trump said the pardons were necessary because Stone and the others faced biased prosecution.

Stone was confronted with “criminal misconduct by Special Counsel (Robert) Mueller’s team” and was “treated very unfairly,” Trump wrote at the time. “He was subjected to a pre-dawn raid on his home, which the media conveniently caught on camera. Mr. Stone also faced potential political bias in his jury trial.”

From the Epoch Times