Biden Pardons 1,500 on His Way Out Oval Office Door

Debra Saunders on Dec 13, 2024

WASHINGTON -- When President Joe Biden issued an unconditional pardon for his son Hunter Biden earlier this month, he took another step in his long walk to placing his presidency on the bottom 10% list.

The unusual blanket pardon covered any and all crimes the president's son, who had been found guilty on federal gun charges and had pleaded guilty to tax evasion charges, may have committed over an 11-year period.

An unintended consequence: The Hunter pardon has fueled pressure on Biden to grant pardons or commutations to people who don't come from powerful political families or have other insider connections.

Voila. Thursday, Biden issued 39 pardons as well as commutations for 1,499 non-violent federal offenders -- a move the White House framed as a traditional holiday practice, especially at the end of a president's first term.

According to Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, this was the largest number of commutations issued in a single day in modern history -- which sounds like a big deal until you learn that these offenders already were placed in home confinement during COVID.

These individuals, KJP told reporters, had "successfully reintegrated" with their families and communities.

(The pardon recipients already served their sentences, some decades ago. Now their records will be swept clean and they will regain their civil rights, including the right to bear arms.)

To add even more irony into the mix: As a U.S. Senator, Biden championed legislation that put even first-time, low-level nonviolent offenders in the drug trade behind bars for decades.

But then his son became a federal offender -- and Biden pardoned him.

To not make it look as if he was hoarding the power for family, it would seem, Biden now is over-commuting.

Margaret Love, who served as the U.S. Pardon Attorney from 1990 to 1997, told me that before the new acts of clemency, Biden "had the worst pardon record of any full-term president in history."

Before the Hunter pardon, according to the Department of Justice, Biden had issued 135 commutations, which reduce or eliminate punishment, and 26 pardons, which erase the record of convictions. That's a stingy record for a Democrat who had campaigned as a criminal justice reformer in 2020.

My instinct has been to support commutations as they provide a needed check on draconian federal sentencing policies once championed by Biden. Then he over-punished. Now he's into under-punishing.

Sadly, this batch of "get out of jail free" cards has the term "rush job" written all over it.

The beneficiaries include white-collar criminals and other non-violent offenders who will have served a fraction of their sentences because of COVID-19, even though COVID is not the public health emergency it was.

Fraudsters rejoice. Dec. 12 was your lucky day.

I could get behind these 1,500 commutations if I thought the administration carefully vetted those who will be spared from serving full terms behind bars.

The White House announcement named pardon recipient Lora Nicole Wood of Maxwell, Nevada. It should have said Maxwell, Nebraska.

A reporter asked during Thursday's press briefing if Biden called any of the recipients.

Good question, KJP responded, but she didn't know.

There was no administration official on hand to field press questions on the decision.

The White House has signaled that the president is considering more pardons, maybe "pre-emptive pardons" for individuals President-elect Donald Trump might want his Department of Justice to prosecute. By the time Biden's term is over, he may well have done as much damage to the pardon power as he has done to his own reputation.

Contact Review-Journal Washington columnist Debra J. Saunders at dsaunders@reviewjournal.com. Follow @debrajsaunders on X.

----