Opinions 5 December 2024

Judge says pardon can't 'rewrite history' of Hunter Biden's crimes

By Brett Rowland
The Center Square

District Judge Mark Scarsi issued a harsh rebuke to President Joe Biden after he pardoned his son, Hunter Biden.

Scarsi, who oversaw Hunter Biden's tax case in California, said the president's pardon doesn't change the facts of the case and can't rewrite history. Biden gave his son a broad pardon for any and all crimes he committed over the past decade. The president said his son was unfairly singled out for prosecution. 

"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," Joe Biden said in a statement. 

Scarsi said that wasn't the case. He noted that "two federal judges expressly rejected Mr. Biden's arguments that the Government prosecuted Mr. Biden because of his familial relation to the President."

"The Constitution provides the President with broad authority to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, but nowhere does the Constitution give the President the authority to rewrite history," Scarsi wrote.

Hunter Biden pleaded guilty over the summer to federal charges of failing to pay $1.4 million in taxes from 2016 to 2020. In June, a jury in Delaware convicted Hunter Biden of illegally buying and owning a gun while using crack cocaine.

Hunter Biden was set to be sentenced on Dec. 12 in the federal gun case in Delaware and on Dec. 16 in the tax evasion case in California.

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