Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC) has so far stayed silent on the decision by President Joe Biden to give a wide-ranging pardon to his son Hunter. The development is likely a tough pill to swallow for the lawmaker, who had publicly celebrated a verdict against Hunter earlier this year as an illustration of Democrats "willing to accept" negative legal outcomes, unlike their Republican counterparts.
Back in June, AOC said that the conviction of Hunter Biden on charges related to lying on a mandatory gun purchasing form showed that "if anything, this shows the difference that Democrats are willing to accept when our justice system works."
"We're not contesting the results. We're not here trying to defund the FBI or the Department of Justice because we don't like the outcome of a given trial. We respect the judicial process," AOC said in an interview with CNN back then.
The pardon marks a reversal as the president had said repeatedly he wouldn't make such a decision. He justified it saying that even though he believes in the justice system, "raw politics has infected this process and it led to a miscarriage of justice."
"Once I made this decision this weekend, there was no sense in delaying it further. I hope Americans will understand why a father and a President would come to this decision," Biden added. He granted his son a "full and unconditional pardon."
The sheer scope of the pardon has led an expert on the matter to say she's "never seen language like this." Speaking with POLITICO, Margaret Love, who served as the U.S. pardon attorney, said the only similar precedent that came to her mind was that of former president Richard Nixon, who was given a blanket pardon by Gerald Ford in 1974.
"I have never seen language like this in a pardon document that purports to pardon offenses that have not apparently even been charged, with the exception of the Nixon pardon," said love, whose position required assisting the president on clemency issues. She added that "even the broadest Trump pardons were specific as to what was being pardoned."
Hunter Biden was set to be sentenced this month on two different charges: the one regarding the purchase of a gun and another one to tax evasion. The "full and unconditional pardon" also applies to also any other crime he might have committed in the past decade.
He was charged in June with two felony counts of making a false statement related to the purchase of a firearm and a third count of illegally possessing a gun while being an unlawful user of drugs. The jury reached the verdict after only three hours of deliberation. The crimes carry sentenced of up to 25 years in prison, although it would have been unlikely for Biden to get that amount.
As for the tax evasion case, Biden was formally accused of engaging in a "four-year scheme to not pay at least $1.4 million in self-assessed federal taxes he owed for tax years 2016 through 2019."
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