President Biden became the latest to expand the limits of presidential powers with his breathtakingly broad pardon of his son Hunter, covering all federal crimes he may have committed over a decade.
Legal analysts said they couldn’t fathom an analogy for Mr. Biden’s action, which covered an unprecedented period, had no limits on the types of crimes pardoned, and included a prospective pardon for any actions Hunter Biden may have taken Sunday night after the pardon was issued.
Conservatives and many liberals said Mr. Biden stretched propriety and gave political cover to his successor, President-elect Donald Trump, to pardon all the participants in the mob attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
The “Full and Unconditional Pardon” applies to Hunter Biden’s federal convictions of tax dodging and illegally purchasing and possessing a firearm and covers any possible crimes for a decade.
The pardon covers every potential federal offense from Jan. 1, 2014, through Dec. 1, 2024, including anything the president’s son might have done in the hours after the pardon was issued.
Hunter Biden joined the board of Ukrainian energy company Burisma in 2014, so the pardon would cover the accusations being investigated on Capitol Hill that he used his father’s name to enrich himself and provided kickbacks to his father.
I don’t know a pardon that stretches back a full 10 years,” said Josh Blackman, a constitutional expert and professor at South Texas College of Law. “Had Hunter Biden murdered someone on Fifth Avenue during that period, he could not be charged with a crime. It is a get-out-of-jail-free card for the past decade, and it’s really remarkable.
Clemency experts said they were unaware of a pardon covering a decade of possible crimes, including unenumerated charges. The only presidential pardons that come even close are half that length.
In 1974, President Ford issued a broad pardon of former President Richard Nixon that covered the Watergate scandal and “all offenses” Nixon may have committed during his five years in the White House. Nearly 100 years earlier, President Andrew Johnson pardoned former Confederate soldiers for their actions during the four-year Civil War.
This would make Nixon blush,” said Jonathan Turley, who teaches constitutional law at George Washington University. “I have never seen language this sweeping except for the Nixon pardon. Of course, Ford was not pardoning his son and covering crimes in a scandal where he himself was implicated.
