Top House Demo­c­rat says Hunter Biden par­don was ‘dis­ap­point­ing,’ calls out Biden for flip-flop

Posted in Election 2024  •  Published by

Rep. Pete Aguilar, D‑Calif., called out Pres­i­dent Biden for going back on his word and par­don­ing his son, Hunter, on Wednes­day, call­ing the move “dis­ap­point­ing.”

Aguilar, who chairs the House Demo­c­ra­t­ic cau­cus, said he under­stood Biden’s deci­sion “as a father,” but argued the par­don did not uphold the rule of law. Rep. Ted Lieu, who joined Aguilar in Wednes­day’s press con­fer­ence, did not com­ment on the par­don.

“As a father, I under­stand it, and I get it. But as some­one who has spent a lot of time at this podi­um talk­ing about the impor­tance of respect­ing the rule of law, it’s dis­ap­point­ing,” Aguilar said.

“The pres­i­dent gave his word and said pub­licly that he was­n’t going to give a par­don and then he did, so that part is dis­ap­point­ing. I believed him when he said he was­n’t,” he said.

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Aguilar joins a num­ber of Democ­rats who have open­ly crit­i­cized Biden’s par­don. Cal­i­for­nia Gov. Gavin New­som said Wednes­day that he also was “dis­ap­point­ed” with Biden’s deci­sion.

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“With every­thing the pres­i­dent and his fam­i­ly have been through, I com­plete­ly under­stand the instinct to pro­tect Hunter, but I took the pres­i­dent at his word,” New­som told Politi­co, adding that he “can’t sup­port the deci­sion.”

In a state­ment announc­ing the par­don, Biden took aim at what he described as a polit­i­cal­ly moti­vat­ed inves­ti­ga­tion.

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“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,” the pres­i­dent wrote.

Biden had vowed mul­ti­ple times that he would not inter­vene in his son’s case, first in June when his son was con­vict­ed on three felony firearm charges, and then in Sep­tem­ber after Hunter plead­ed guilty to fed­er­al charges of tax eva­sion.

“I am not going to do any­thing,” Biden said this sum­mer. “I will abide by the jury’s deci­sion.”