Congressional Republicans harshly criticized President Biden following his decision to pardon his son Hunter on Sunday night. They accused the outgoing president of going back on his promise not to interfere in his son's federal criminal cases. Biden faced intense backlash shortly after announcing the pardon for Hunter, who was convicted of three felony gun charges in June and pleaded guilty to misdemeanor and felony charges related to tax evasion amounting to at least $1.4 million in September.
"I'm shocked Pres Biden pardoned his son Hunter [because] he said many many times he wouldn't & I believed him Shame on me," Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley commented on social media. "Most Americans can sympathize with a father's decision to pardon his son, even if they disagree," Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton tweeted. "What they can't forgive is Biden lying about it repeatedly before the election."
Before and even after the presidential election, Biden and the White House maintained that Hunter would not receive a pardon from his father. "We've been asked that question multiple times. Our answer stands, which is no," press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre stated on Nov. 8. Rep. James Comer, who led one of the congressional investigations into the Biden family, argued that the criminal charges against Hunter were "just the tip of the iceberg."
"Joe Biden has lied from start to finish about his family's corrupt influence peddling activities. Not only has he falsely claimed that he never met with his son's foreign business associates and that his son did nothing wrong, but he also lied when he said he would not pardon Hunter Biden," Comer said in a statement. "The charges Hunter faced were just the tip of the iceberg in the blatant corruption that President Biden and the Biden Crime Family have lied about to the American people. It's unfortunate that, rather than come clean about their decades of wrongdoing, President Biden and his family continue to do everything they can to avoid accountability."
Biden justified his decision to pardon his son by asserting that Hunter was unfairly prosecuted in two criminal cases, which he claimed were politically motivated. The action covers any offenses Hunter might have committed—and his father may have been involved in—between Jan. 1, 2014, and Dec. 1, 2024, including Hunter's time on the board of Ukrainian natural gas company Burisma Holdings while Joe Biden was overseeing the nation as vice president. House Republicans scrutinized Hunter's foreign business dealings—which also included significant earnings from Chinese state-linked energy firms—and accused President Biden of interacting with his relatives' foreign business partners when he was vice president in an effort to influence peddle and subsequently obstructing their probe of the matter.
An impeachment inquiry was opened last year to investigate whether Biden engaged in "abuse of power" and "obstruction of justice or obstruction of Congress" before it was dropped after the 82-year-old Democrat withdrew his reelection bid. "Democrats said there was nothing to our impeachment inquiry," Rep. Jim Jordon posted on X. "If that's the case, why did Joe Biden just issue Hunter Biden a pardon for the very things we were inquiring about?" "Joe Biden issued a pardon to Hunter Biden for any crimes that he might have committed since 2014," said Rep. Jim Banks, who was elected senator of Indiana this past November. "Why such a specific year? Well, Hunter Biden just so happened to join the board of Burisma, a Ukrainian energy firm, in that same year, 2014. So corrupt."
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