As you have likely read by now, on Sunday night, President Biden issued a blanket pardon to his troubled son Hunter Biden, for a period covering January 1, 2014 through December 1, 2024. Hunter Biden has been federally convicted of tax evasion and illegally purchasing a firearm; however, he has not yet been sentenced. This announcement came after years of him and his staff promising not to do so. Though his statement did not call out Trump’s nomination of Kash Patel to run the FBI as a factor in his decision, the timing is noteworthy.
“The charges in his cases came about only after several of my political opponents in Congress instigated them to attack me and oppose my election,” Mr. Biden said in 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.”
Predictably, this announcement ignited a debate across the political spectrum, with many on both the left and the right calling out Biden’s hypocrisy around upholding norms and faith in our justice system. Defenders, or at least non-detractors, pointed to Donald Trump’s reelection as proof that playing fair is a sucker’s game in 2024, and that he was only doing what any loving father would do.
While as a father I certainly understand President
@JoeBiden’s natural desire to help his son by pardoning him, I am disappointed that he put his family ahead of the country. This is a bad precedent that could be abused by later Presidents and will sadly tarnish his reputation. When you become President, your role is Pater familias of the nation. Hunter brought the legal trouble he faced on himself, and one can sympathize with his struggles while also acknowledging that no one is above the law, not a President and not a President’s son.
One who person who had a lot of opinions on this news was a person the internet has a lot of opinions about: Nate Silver.
My maybe very wrong expectation is that within a few days of the next Trump administration, this will all be forgotten. Or Trump will be able to weaponize this despite his miles-long track record of corruption and abuse of power. We’ll see!
Before moving on, and on a more serious note, a quick aside on Trump’s nominee for FBI Director Kash Patel. There’s enough on him going back to the early days of Trump’s first administration to warrant an entire deep dive TOTI. But here some quick hits from the profile of him making the rounds this week:
Ladies and gentlemen. meet Kash Patel, the president-elect’s choice to run the FBI:
“In The Plot Against the King, a children’s book, [Kash] Patel tells the story of a wizard named Kash who sets out to save King Donald from the sinister machinations of Hillary Queenton and a “shifty knight.”
“Patel produced ‘Justice for All,’ a version of the national anthem sung by jailed January 6 defendants and played by Trump at his first 2024 campaign rally.”
“Patel expressed no doubt about his capacity to deliver the goods. ‘We will go out and find the conspirators, not just in government but in the media,’ he said. ‘Yes, we’re going to come after the people in the media who lied about American citizens, who helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections—we’re going to come after you.’”
“’A lot of people say he’s crazy,’ Trump once said of Patel, according to the longtime adviser. ‘I think he’s kind of crazy. But sometimes you need a little crazy.’”
“The prevailing sentiment in Trump’s inner circle, according to the longtime adviser, is that there is no upside to calling out Patel’s exaggerations or lies. By now, this person explained, Trump is entrenched in his view of Patel as a ‘useful tool.’ The former president, the adviser said, understands that ‘Kash is the one you say to, ‘Hey, I’m not telling you to go break into the DNC. But…’ ”
Yet the prevailing sentiment in Trump’s inner circle, according to the longtime adviser, is that there is no upside to calling out Patel’s exaggerations or lies. By now, this person explained, Trump is entrenched in his view of Patel as a “useful tool.” The former president, the adviser said, understands that “Kash is the one you say to, ‘Hey, I’m not telling you to go break into the DNC. But …’ ” –The Atlantic
Continued in Part 2.
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