{"id":20162,"date":"2024-12-02T07:08:15","date_gmt":"2024-12-02T07:08:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gpt.m2mbeta.com\/?p=20162"},"modified":"2024-12-02T07:08:15","modified_gmt":"2024-12-02T07:08:15","slug":"biden-hopes-americans-will-understand-sons-pardon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gpt.m2mbeta.com\/?p=20162","title":{"rendered":"Biden hopes Americans will understand son's pardon"},"content":{"rendered":"
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US President Joe Biden has issued an official pardon for his son Hunter, who was facing sentencing for two criminal cases, despite previously ruling it out.<\/p>\n

In a statement, the president said his son had been “singled out” and called his cases “a miscarriage of justice”.<\/p>\n

Hunter Biden pleaded guilty to tax charges earlier in September, and was found guilty of being an illegal drug user in possession of a gun in June – becoming the first child of a sitting president to be a convicted of a crime.<\/p>\n

Reacting to the pardon, President-elect Donald Trump said: “Does the Pardon given by Joe to Hunter include the [6 January] Hostages, who have now been imprisoned for years? Such an abuse and miscarriage of Justice!”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Trump was referring to his supporters who stormed the US Capitol on 6 January 2021 in a bid to overturn Trump’s defeat in the 2020 election.<\/p>\n

Joe Biden’s full and unconditional pardon for his son comes after the president had previously said he would not give him clemency.<\/p>\n

Just a couple of months ago, in September, the White House press secretary said that Biden would not issue a pardon for his son.<\/p>\n

But on Sunday evening, President Biden said although he believed in the justice system, “politics has infected this process and it led to a miscarriage of justice”.<\/p>\n

“From the day I took office, I said I would not interfere with the Justice Department\u2019s decision-making, and I kept my word even as I have watched my son being selectively, and unfairly, prosecuted,” he said.<\/p>\n

Biden said he wrestled with the decision, and added: “once I made this decision this weekend, there was no sense in delaying it further.”<\/p>\n

“I hope Americans will understand why a father and a President would come to this decision,” he said.<\/p>\n

In a reaction statement, Hunter Biden said mistakes he made during the darkest days of his addiction had been “exploited to publicly humiliate and shame” his family for political sport.<\/p>\n

“I will never take the clemency I have been given today for granted and will devote the life I have rebuilt to helping those who are still sick and suffering,” the 54-year-old added.<\/p>\n

The younger Biden has been sober for five-and-a-half years, his father said.<\/p>\n

This is not the first time a US president has pardoned a member of their family.<\/p>\n

Bill Clinton pardoned his younger half-brother, Roger Clinton, for a 1985 cocaine-related offence in 2001.<\/p>\n

In 2020, Donald Trump pardoned Charles Kushner, the father-in-law of his daughter Ivanka. President-elect Trump has recently announced that Kushner will be the new ambassador to France<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Hunter Biden pleaded guilty to nine counts of federal tax fraud in September, for which he had been facing up to 17 years in prison.<\/p>\n

He was also convicted of three felonies in connection with a gun purchase in June, for which he had been facing up to 25 years in prison.<\/p>\n

Sentencing for these cases had been scheduled for 12 and 16 December.<\/p>\n

His legal troubles had been a dark cloud over his father’s presidential campaign, which came to an end in July after Biden pulled out of the election race<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Biden endorsed Vice-President Kamala Harris to succeed him as the Democratic candidate, who lost the election to Republican Donald Trump<\/a> in November. <\/p>\n

Trump is set to take over the Oval Office from Biden on 20 January 2025 – Inauguration Day.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

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Source: <\/em> www.bbc.com\u2026<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

US President Joe Biden has issued an official pardon for his son Hunter, who was facing sentencing for two criminal cases, despite previously ruling it out. In a statement, the president said his son had been “singled out” and called his cases “a miscarriage of justice”. Hunter Biden pleaded guilty to tax charges earlier in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20162","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gpt.m2mbeta.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20162","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gpt.m2mbeta.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gpt.m2mbeta.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gpt.m2mbeta.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gpt.m2mbeta.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20162"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gpt.m2mbeta.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20162\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gpt.m2mbeta.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gpt.m2mbeta.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gpt.m2mbeta.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}