Reuters
[Source: Reuters]
U.S. President Joe Biden said on Sunday he had pardoned his son, Hunter Biden, who had been convicted of making false statements on a gun background check and illegally possessing a firearm and pled guilty to federal tax charges.
The White House had said repeatedly that Biden would not pardon or commute the sentences of his son, a recovering drug addict who became a target of Republicans, including President-elect Donald Trump.
Hunter Biden faced sentencing for the false statements and gun convictions on Wednesday. In September he pled guilty to federal charges of failing to pay $1.4 million in taxes while spending lavishly on drugs, sex workers and luxury items. He faced sentencing in that case on Dec. 16.
The president, whose son Beau died of brain cancer in 2015, said his opponents had sought to break Hunter with selective prosecution.
He said people were almost never brought to trial for felony charges over how they filled out a gun form, and said others who were late in paying taxes because of addiction but paid them back with interest and penalties as his son had typically received “non-criminal resolutions” to their cases.
Biden said he had made the decision over the weekend. The president, his wife, Jill Biden, and their family including Hunter, spent the Thanksgiving holiday in Nantucket, Massachusetts and returned to Washington on Saturday night.
During a walk around Nantucket shops on Friday afternoon, one supporter shouted at the president from across a street to pardon his son.
