President Biden’s Pardon of His Son

The US press is chock full of articles and commentary about President Biden’s decision to give his son Hunter an unconditional pardon for all the crimes he may have committed and even those of which he may yet be accused.

A sweeping pardon such as this one is unusual, yet the circumstances which exist in the US today are also unusual. For the record, the president elect did state publicly on June 13, 2023 at an event at his golf club in Bedminster, NJ that if elected president: “I will appoint a real special prosecutor to go after the most corrupt president in the history of the United States of America, Joe Biden, and the entire Biden crime family.”

History has shown that the president elect generally does what he threatens to do.  Given that, is it any wonder that President Biden would be concerned for his legal future and that of his family, even though he had promised earlier that he would not use a presidential pardon for his son? Our tradition is very clear about taking threats seriously and defending against them. The Talmud in Sanhedrin 72 a-b goes one step further and says that is someone comes planning to kill you, you should hurry to kill him first.

Unlike seemingly most people in the world today, I am the first one to admit that I don’t have THE TRUTH and that I can also be wrong. Yet, as someone who is 3 years older than Biden, like him I’ve seen a lot of water go under the bridge and have made my mistakes, for sure…..and paid dearly for many of them. I’ve also buried a child of 19 and my first wife before the age of 50 and seen a lot of dirty politicians (remember, I spent 20 years of my life in Chicago from 1964-84).

None of that, of course, justifies skirting the law or going back on a promise. I am convinced that Biden knows this. Down deep, I believe he is basically a good man who was faced with a choice none of us should have to make and he made the choice to be a father and use his political power while he has it to save his son. I’m not sure how many of us would have had the courage to do otherwise when the incoming president has vowed to go after pretty much everyone in the outgoing administration.

I am, therefore, probably, less judgmental than most people as I most likely would have done the same thing faced with the facts at hand. I also think that the God he believes in would have been disappointed in Biden if he had done otherwise given the power that was in his hands to do what he did.

Perhaps we can learn from Portia’s soliloquy in Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice where she begins with the words….

The quality of mercy is not strain’d.
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest:
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.

We would all do well to remember these words and extend a bit of compassion and understanding while being thankful that we are not faced with the same choices and history. At the end of the day, Biden, like all the rest of us is a human being, imperfect, somewhat flawed yet empowered by the natural order of a parent wanting to protect his child.