With less than 50 days left in the White House, President Joe Biden has taken a controversial step he had previously vowed he wouldn’t take: pardoning his son Hunter Biden.
On Sunday night, Biden announced he had granted his son clemency for “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.”
Presidents can grant clemency, including both pardons (forgiving federal criminal offenses) and commutations (reducing penalties) for federal convictions. Presidents cannot pardon those convicted of state crimes.
In June, Hunter, 54, was convicted of three federal gun charges related to his purchase of a firearm in 2018. Three months later, he pleaded guilty to nine federal tax charges in September.
So what does the president’s pardon cover?
Federal gun charges
On June 1, Hunter was convicted of all three felony counts in Wilmington, Delaware in his federal gun trial.
The president’s son was found guilty of lying on a mandatory gun purchase form on October 12, 2018, when he bought a 38 Colt Special revolver at a store in Wilmington.
On the form, he stated that he was not illegally using or addicted to drugs, when he was actually in the grips of addiction at the time.
Hunter had the gun for 11 days before it was dumped in a trash can outside a grocery store by Hallie Biden, the widow of his brother Beau Biden, on October 23, 2018. The gun was subsequently found by an elderly man searching for recyclables, before police tracked him down and seized it.
At his trial, prosecutors presented painful personal details about Hunter’s drug use – showing photos and texts from his ex-girlfriends and pressing his eldest daughter, Naomi, on the stand about her ability to tell if her father was sober.
His conviction marked the first time a sitting president’s child was found guilty of a crime.
At the time, Biden said: “I will accept the outcome of this case and will continue to respect the judicial process as Hunter considers an appeal.”
Hunter was facing up to 25 years in prison and fines of up to $750,000 at his sentencing on December 12.
But now, Hunter won’t be sentenced and will avoid any potential jail time.
Federal tax charges
Just over three months after his conviction on gun charges, Hunter pleaded guilty on September 5 to nine federal tax charges.
The plea came as jury selection was set to get underway in the case in LA and marked a U-turn from his initial fight against the charges.
Hunter was indicted on nine tax-related criminal charges in December 2023, with prosecutors arguing that he made millions between 2016 and 2019 by skipping out on more than $1.4 million, at which point he was said to be indulging in an “extravagant lifestyle” and spending money on “everything but his taxes.”
Prosecutors said Hunter spent the money he avoided spending on his taxes on “drugs, escorts and girlfriends, luxury hotels and rental properties, exotic cars, clothing, and other items of a personal nature.”
Hunter later paid all his due taxes and fines in 2020 after getting a loan from his personal lawyer.
Hunter previously sought an Alford Plea in the case, which would have allowed him to maintain his innocence, but prosecutors refused.
After pleading guilty, his sentencing was scheduled for December 16. He faced up to 17 years in prison, but experts said he was unlikely to receive more than three years.
Like his gun charges case, Hunter will now face no sentencing nor jail time.
Burisma business dealings
Biden’s pardon covers his son’s offenses or alleged offenses dating back to January 1 2014, meaning Hunter is also protected from any other crimes he has not yet been charged with during that period.
It’s a timeline that covers Hunter’s time as a board member of Ukrainian energy company Burisma – a role that Republicans have honed in on, claiming without evidence that his foreign business dealings were corrupt.
Hunter joined the board of Ukrainian energy company Burisma in April 2014, initially making more than $1 million per year.
At the time, then-Vice President Biden was working on rooting out corruption in Ukraine, arguing that the top prosecutor in the country, Viktor Shokin, was preventing corruption probes and he organized international leaders to push for his removal – the parliament booted him in 2016.
Republicans have claimed that Shokin was fired because he was looking into Burisma. There’s no solid evidence that Biden was connected to his son’s business dealings and he has always said that he didn’t speak about business with his son or his business partners.
But a business partner of Hunter, Devon Archer, testified in a closed-door hearing that Hunter often put his father on speakerphone during calls with a number of contacts.
Rep. James Comer, who led the impeachment inquiry for the House Oversight Committee, claimed that the then-vice president was made into a brand used to make the Biden family wealthy.
But the first impeachment hearing was widely panned as an abysmal failure, with not a single witness claiming to have firsthand evidence of wrongdoing by the president. No charges have ever been filed in connection to the accusations.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
