Monday, Dec. 2 | By Jonathan Easley

©  Kris Connor, Wire Image

DEMOCRATS ARE REELING after President Biden’s move to pardon his son Hunter Biden sent shockwaves across Washington and beyond.

Hunter Biden faced sentencing later this month after being found guilty on felony gun charges and after pleading guilty to tax evasion in a separate case. His lawyers have already moved to have the cases dismissed.

The president promised repeatedly over the past year that he would not grant clemency to his son, saying he would respect the judicial process however it played out. When Trump’s convictions came down from the hush money case, Biden posted on X that “no one is above the law.”

Biden not only backtracked on his promise but he went further, suggesting his son had been targeted for political purposes and granting immunity for any crime Hunter Biden may have committed dating back to 2014.

Special counsel David Weiss, a Trump appointee whom Attorney General Merrick Garland granted special counsel status to probe Hunter Biden, disputed the president's claim "raw politics" had "infected" his son's case.

“There was none and never has been any evidence of vindictive or selective prosecution in this case,” Weiss wrote in court filings. 

Weiss argued that even if Hunter Biden is spared punishment, the pardon does not absolve him of guilt.

"That does not mean the grand jury’s decision to charge him, based on a finding of probable cause, should be wiped away as if it never occurred...It also does not mean that his charges should be wiped away because the defendant falsely claimed that the charges were the result of some improper motive. No court has agreed with the defendant on these baseless claims, and his request to dismiss the indictment finds no support in the law or the practice of this district.”

Democrats have spent years warning that President-elect Trump’s attacks on the Justice Department represent a direct threat to democracy. They’ve defended the justice system against accusations of politically motivated prosecutions.

Now, Democrats fear Biden has effectively neutered those arguments.

“President Biden’s decision put personal interest ahead of duty and further erodes Americans’ faith that the justice system is fair and equal for all,” Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) posted on X.

Rep. Greg Stanton (D-Ariz.) disputed the president's characterization of Hunter Biden's prosecution being "infected" by politics.

“This wasn’t a politically-motivated prosecution. Hunter committed felonies, and was convicted by a jury of his peers,” he said.

Colorado Gov. Jared Polis (D), a potential 2028 presidential contender, said the pardon will “tarnish” Biden’s reputation.

“This is a bad precedent that could be abused by later Presidents.”

Biden arrived in Angola on Monday afternoon for his final foreign trip as president.

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, who stated repeatedly that there was no chance Biden would ever pardon his son, defended the action in front of angry reporters on Air Force One.

She said Biden "agonized" over the decision but ultimately feared Trump’s Justice Department would never stop pursuing his son.

“One of the reasons the president did the pardon is because it didn’t seem like his political opponents would let go of it, it didn’t seem like they would move on," Jean-Pierre said.

The spokesperson was asked pointedly whether she believes Biden’s Justice Department was targeting his son for political reasons, and how many other cases may have been warped by politics.

“He believes in the Department of Justice but he also believes that his son was singled out politically and so he made this decision,” she said, adding while she can’t speak to other potentially politically motivated cases, Biden “believes the warped politics infected the process and led to a miscarriage of justice.”

Several Democrats have come to Biden’s defense.

Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) said GOP lawmakers should “take a look in the mirror,” while accusing Trump’s Cabinet nominees of being corrupt.

“Way to go Joe," Crockett said. "Let me be the first one to congratulate the president for deciding to do this.”

Former Obama-era Attorney General Eric Holder said the gun charges should never have been brought against Hunter Biden, who was found guilty of lying on a federal gun application about his drug use.

“No U.S. Attorney would have charged this case given the underlying facts,” Holder posted on X.

The news coverage of Biden’s pardon was aggressive and largely negative, after many in the media took Biden at his word when he promised not to pardon his son.

NBC reported that Biden has been telling his closest aides since June that a pardon was on the table, despite his emphatic public statements to the contrary. The White House disputes this.

CNN legal analyst Elie Honig called the pardon a “historic act of political nepotism.”

Republicans spread video clips on social media of Democrats previously praising Biden for his steadfast refusal to pardon Hunter and accusing Trump of obstruction of justice for interfering in Justice Department cases.

For his part, Trump hinted that Biden’s actions might provoke him to pardon the Jan. 6 rioters, something he's been widely expected to act on after his inauguration.

“Does the Pardon given by Joe to Hunter include the J-6 Hostages, who have now been imprisoned for years? Such an abuse and miscarriage of Justice!" he posted on TruthSocial.