Hunter Biden Indicted on Federal Tax Charges

[Officer of Engineers]

Well, here's Biden's legacy right there.

[Amled]

It’s easy to imagine that many of Biden’s supporters secretly had inkling that this is what would happen, if it came down to the wire.
After all when Bill Clinton left office, he also pardoned his brother.
As for his opponents, Trump was quick to climb on his moral soapbox, and decry the pardon as:” a miscarriage of justice”!
Friggin hypocrite, he is conveniently forgetting the slew of pardons he wrote setting free his friends and supporters!
Let’s be honest. Wouldn’t most of us do the same?
If we had the power of saving a daughter or son from jail-time simply by a stroke of your pen, even a wastrel waste-of-space like Hunter Biden?

[Monash]

It’s easy to imagine that many of Biden’s supporters secretly had inkling that this is what would happen, if it came down to the wire.
After all when Bill Clinton left office, he also pardoned his brother.
As for his opponents, Trump was quick to climb on his moral soapbox, and decry the pardon as:” a miscarriage of justice”!
Friggin hypocrite, he is conveniently forgetting the slew of pardons he wrote setting free his friends and supporters!
Let’s be honest. Wouldn’t most of us do the same?
If we had the power of saving a daughter or son from jail-time simply by a stroke of your pen, even a wastrel waste-of-space like Hunter Biden?

due

To my mind? Biden's only justification would be that Trump would have been President when Hunter was to be sentenced. Ordinarily? The firearm charge he was convicted of doesn't usually involve a term of imprisonment unless there are extenuating circumstances. The Tax charge? If he's already paid back what he owes plus penalties? Given the amount involved he'd probably do a few months at best given his record and the repayment etc. The issue? If it was virtually anyone else becoming President? I wouldn't worry about them trying to interfere with Hunter's the sentencing. Trump? Absolutely would if he could.

[DOR]

Go to Wikipedia.
Look at the page listing all presidential pardons.
Glance down the list of traitors, murderers, and other nasty folk.
Now, imagine a list in order of severity of the crime, and have a wild guess where Hunter Biden might rank.
Next, rank pardons by both severity and political party, and imagine the total lack of outrage if Joe Biden were a GOPer.

[JRT]

Monday, 02 December 2024
Read Hunter Biden's pardon and President Biden's full statement
by Caroline Linton
CBS News

President Biden on Sunday night issued a sweeping "full and unconditional pardon" of his son Hunter, who was convicted earlier this year of federal gun and drug charges and pleaded guilty to federal tax charges in California.

The pardon covers offenses that Hunter Biden "has committed or may have committed or taken part in during the period from January 1, 2014 through December 1, 2024," and is not limited to offenses charged or prosecuted.

In a statement about the pardon, Mr. Biden insisted "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."

=====================
Read the pardon

Executive Grant of Clemency
Joseph R. Biden, Jr.
President of the United States of America

To All to Whom These Presents Shall Come, Greeting:

Be It Known, That This Day, I, Joseph R. Biden, Jr., President of the United States, Pursuant to My Powers Under Article II, Section 2, Clause 1, of the Constitution, Have Granted Unto

ROBERT HUNTER BIDEN

A Full and Unconditional Pardon

For those offenses against the United States which he has committed or may have committed or taken part in during the period from January 1, 2014 through December 1, 2024, including but not limited to all offenses charged or prosecuted (including any that have resulted in convictions) by Special Counsel David C. Weiss in Docket No. 1:23-cr-00061-MN in the United States District Court for the District of Delaware and Docket No. 2:23-CR-00599-MCS-1 in the United States District Court for the Central District of California.

IN TESTIMONY WHEREOF I have hereunto signed my name and caused the Pardon to be recorded with the Department of Justice.

Done at the City of Washington this 1st day of December in the year of our Lord Two Thousand and Twenty-four and of the Independence of the United States the Two Hundred and Forty-ninth.

=====================

President Biden's full statement

Today, I signed a pardon for my son Hunter. From the day I took office, I said I would not interfere with the Justice Department's decision-making, and I kept my word even as I have watched my son being selectively, and unfairly, prosecuted. Without aggravating factors like use in a crime, multiple purchases, or buying a weapon as a straw purchaser, people are almost never brought to trial on felony charges solely for how they filled out a gun form. Those who were late paying their taxes because of serious addictions, but paid them back subsequently with interest and penalties, are typically given non-criminal resolutions. It is clear that Hunter was treated differently.

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. Then, a carefully negotiated plea deal, agreed to by the Department of Justice, unraveled in the court room – with a number of my political opponents in Congress taking credit for bringing political pressure on the process. Had the plea deal held, it would have been a fair, reasonable resolution of Hunter's cases.

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.

...

Joe Biden should have simply exercised the POTUS' absolute power of pardon. Joe should not have included any criticism of the justice system in any way in this, as doing so only served to unnecessarily provide lame excuses, nothing worthwhile.

Don Johnny Trump and his MAGA Trumpsters will hold these criticisms out as examples if and when they run roughshod over the US justice system during the second term of the Orange Menace. Joe Biden should not have provided that to them, especially since he gained nothing in return.

In a different history...

1. Joe should have done this cleanly without any excuses or apology. The POTUS' power of federal pardon is absolute, and needs no further justification.
2. Joe should have done this much sooner, perhaps as soon as on the day after Kamala admitted her defeat and conceded the election.
3. Joe should have provided very much better cover by taking that occasion to also pardon Don Johnny Trump of all federal crimes committed prior to the day of the pardon. The follow-on public conversation would have been dominated by that rather than much of anything about Hunter. Trump was not going to face federal charges after winning the election as it is against US Justice department policy to prosecute a sitting POTUS. Joe could have gotten out in front of that. The excuse would have been that the electorate has spoken by reelecting Trump, and the incoming POTUS needs to focus on the job, without impediments of further legal distraction.
4. In the associated speech, Joe Biden could have stated that he knows his son, and that his son is sober, and is not the man that he was (regardless whatever the truth might be). And also that his son Hunter is now much more deserving of pardon than Trump ever will be. Then Joe should have continued by detailing the very long list of charges against Don johnny Trump, for which he was being pardoned.
5. Joe should have signed an executive order publicly disclosing all evidence, testimony, and depositions in the investigations and prosecutions of Don Johnny Trump.
6. Joe Biden also should have detailed Trump's various state level charges and convictions, while explaining that it is not within his Federal power to pardon Trump of any of those, while also calling on the state(s) Governor(s) to likewise pardon Trump, so that the country can move forward.
7. Don Johnny Trump would not reject the pardon, and by implicitly accepting the pardon, Don Johnny Trump would be implicitly admitting his guilt. And that would be a big political win for Joe Biden.

.

[Officer of Engineers]

Go to Wikipedia.
Look at the page listing all presidential pardons.
Glance down the list of traitors, murderers, and other nasty folk.
Now, imagine a list in order of severity of the crime, and have a wild guess where Hunter Biden might rank.
Next, rank pardons by both severity and political party, and imagine the total lack of outrage if Joe Biden were a GOPer.

Yes, let's look at the data!

Andrew Johnson, Democrat, - 12,000 ACW pardons - dwarfing all the "traitors, murders, and other nasty folks" by all the Republican POTUS combined and then, there's Jimmy Carter, another Democrat, who pardoned another 200,000 traitors, who swamped EVERY POTUS COMBINED!

[Gun Grape]

I think the majority of Americans would have been OK with the pardon for the President had come on TV, or issued a press release ANd just said

" Today I'm going to pardon my son. I said earlier that I wouldn't but at that time I thought I would be reelected. I will now do what any father would if given a chance.
And look after my family"


But I also think that Bush would have done better with the Gulf War if instead of some BS chemical weapons excuse had just said " We have found out that Hussain tried to assassinate my Daddy. The former President . And that's just wrong so we are going to get rid of the threat"

[JRT]

Saturday, 28 December 2024
Newly released pictures show Joe Biden meeting Hunter Biden’s Chinese business partners

<<< follow link above to full article to view pictures and captions >>>

(CNN) — Newly released pictures show then-Vice President Joe Biden meeting some of his son Hunter Biden’s Chinese business partners during an official visit to the country, as well as Hunter meeting Chinese President Xi Jinping and other senior officials.

This is the first time these images have been made public, even though the photo ops and meetings they depict have been known about for years. The National Archives and Records Administration released the images after a public records request from a pro-Trump right-wing legal group.

The photographs are from Joe Biden’s visit to China in 2013. In one set of images, Hunter Biden is seen, along with his father, meeting and chatting with Xi. In another set of images, Joe Biden introduces his son to Li Yuanchao, who was China’s vice president at the time.

Another group of pictures shows Hunter Biden introducing his father to his Chinese business partners, some of whom were executives at the private equity firm BHR Partners. After handshakes and hugs, the Bidens posed for a group picture with a few of the Chinese businessmen.

These images are notable because they further undercut Joe Biden’s already-diminished unequivocal assertions that he never had any business-related contact with his son. In fact, the House Republicans’ impeachment inquiry into Joe Biden uncovered at least two dozen interactions between him and his son’s business partners from China and other countries.

However, Hunter Biden and others involved have testified that — despite occasional phone calls, meet-and-greets and dinners with Joe Biden — business was never substantively discussed. Hunter Biden’s former main US business partner later testified that Hunter was selling the “illusion” of access to his father, but “nothing of material was discussed” during these interactions.

Hunter Biden’s attorney Abbe Lowell criticized the Trump-aligned groups that fought to obtain and release the images, saying in a statement, “There is simply nothing new here.”

“The photos match perfectly to Hunter’s congressional testimony description of who he saw at this public event during a 2013 trip to China,” Lowell said, referring to Hunter Biden’s closed-door deposition in February, during which he was grilled by Republicans for six hours.

“These attacks trying to twist these images into something they are not is just more of the same old tired, misinformation spin from some Republicans who can’t let go of their ridiculous conspiracy theories and baseless accusations,” Lowell said in the statement.

America First Legal, a pro-Trump group, filed the records request in 2022 and later sued the National Archives to obtain the records. The group is led by Stephen Miller, who served in President-elect Donald Trump’s first White House and is set to return next year as deputy chief of staff for policy.

“These photos corroborate the House Oversight Committee’s investigative findings that Hunter Biden arranged for his father to meet with Jonathan Li and other BHR executives during the 2013 China trip, where ‘Mr. Li sought — and received — access to Vice President Biden’s political power,’” America First Legal said in a news release last week.

CNN has reached out to the White House for comment about the newly released pictures.

Hunter Biden’s foreign business deals drew intense scrutiny from Hill Republicans and Justice Department investigators. Federal prosecutors charged him with tax crimes partly stemming from unpaid taxes from his overseas deals. He was never accused of corruption or illegal lobbying, despite GOP claims that he engaged in criminal influence-peddling.

In a controversial postelection move, Joe Biden pardoned his son for the 12 tax and gun crimes he was convicted of earlier this year. The sweeping pardon also shielded Hunter Biden from future prosecution for any potential federal crimes he may have committed between January 1, 2014, and December 1, 2024.

...