The Final Pardons

With his presidency coming to a close, President Biden slipped in a few more pardons.  There is retired General Mark Milley, Dr. Anthony Fauci, all the members of Congress who served on the J6 Committee, various DC and US Capitol police, and, of course, three of his siblings and their spouses.  No, nothing to see here, move along.  Unlike his son, who was convicted of crimes and indicted for crimes, these people are not.  What is being pardoned?  The claim will be to prevent Trump from taking revenge on his enemies.  You know, we wouldn't want the president to target political rivals with the power of government, like when President Biden's DOJ went after Trump, Giuliani, Steve Bannon, etc.  This tells us more about the thinking of Biden than the thinking of Trump, because Biden already did what he thinks Trump might do.

Generally, accepting a pardon is equated with admitting guilt.  What exactly would each of these folks be admitting?  For what crimes could Trump's DOJ pursue them?  Milley should have been fired for the Afghanistan debacle, but that isn't criminal.  His backdoor chats with the Chinese during the interregnum were a sore spot with Trump, who called it treason, but is that worthy of pursuing now that tempers have calmed?  Rand Paul has been particularly active against Dr. Fauci, indicating that he lied to Congress and participated in illegal gain-of-function research.  Is he someone Trump would pursue or is Fauci being protected from Senator Paul now that the control has shifted to Republicans?  Now the J6 Committee is an interesting one.  Once the tapes were released in 2023, a different picture of the 'insurrection' was painted.  The Q-Anon Shaman was escorted to the Senate chambers by the Capitol Police!  Was the committee impartial or did it cherry pick the evidence to reveal while hiding mitigating facts?  Did it do anything criminal?  Biden must think there could be something there or why the pardons?  As far as the pardons for his family, that is doubtless for the same shenanigans that surrounded Hunter.

These create a bad precedent.  Pardons should be for specific crimes, not a shield against any future prosecution.  When Jimmy Carter issued a pardon for all the draft dodgers, it was for evading the draft.  It did not pardon them for assault, murder, fraud, etc.  A specific crime was pardoned.  The Constitution states:

 

...he shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.

Providing a pardon without the crime is a case of putting the cart before the horse.

Pardon Me

The power to pardon has been in the Constitution from the beginning.  George Washington issued 16 pardons during his 2 terms in office.  Only William Henry Harrison and James Garfield issued fewer pardons.  In fact, they each issued none on account of dying early in their presidencies.  John Adams, the sole Federalist president, only issued 20.  The power of the pardon has grown since then.  Let's see how that breaks down by party.

Independent

Washington didn't like the party system though he most aligned with the Federalist Party.  However, he spoke against parties so he's generally classified as Independent.  He offered 16 pardons.  John Tyler, the 10th President, was originally a Democrat but switched to Whig.  When he took over for William Henry Harrison, the Whigs disowned him and the Democrats didn't want him.  Thus, he falls into the Independent Party.  He offered 209 pardons.  Tyler lifted the average per president quite a bit.

Federalist

There was only 1 Federalist, President John Adams.  Following Washington, he was stingy with the pardons, only granting 20 in his 4 years as president.

Democratic-Republican

The Party of Thomas Jefferson, it primarily competed with the Federalist until they disintegrated after the War of 1812.  Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, and John Quincy Adams were Democratic-Republicans.  The party was much more generous with pardons, offering 917.

Democratic

Having lost the 1824 election, Andrew Jackson split from the Democratic-Republicans to create a new party.  This is the Democratic Party that continues to this day.  It is the most generous with pardons, averaging 1,489 per president.  This number does not include Andrew Johnson's blanket pardon for many Confederates after the Civil War or Jimmy Carter's blanket pardon to over 200,000 draft dodgers after Vietnam.  Franklin Pierce was the stingiest with pardons (142), while Joe Biden has more than doubled 2nd place FDR (3,687) with 8,027 pardons so far.

Of particular note, Joe Biden has dramatically lifted the average.  Removing Joe Biden's 8,027 pardons, drops the Democratic average to 1,053 per Democratic president.  How high will it go by January 20th?

This reminds me of Al Gore's hockey stick graph.

Whig

There were only 3 Whig Presidents and two of them died early in their presidencies.  The Whigs only issued 208 pardons.

Republican

The Party of Lincoln has had more presidents than its nearest rival, the Democrats.  A Republican president averages 701 pardons.  Calvin Coolidge offered the most pardons (1,545) of any Republican while George HW Bush offered the fewest (77), if we excluded James Garfield, who issued none before his assassination.

From Eisenhower to Trump (1953 to 2021), there were 8,126 pardons.  President Biden is going for the Guinness Book of World Records.

The Blanket Pardon

Despite promises to the contrary, President Biden has pardoned his son for all crimes - whether convicted, charged, or even suspected - from 2014 through today, December 1, 2024.  Wow, we didn't see that coming at all.  What a huge surprise.  Sure, every political pundit predicted exactly this would happen, but otherwise this comes out of the blue.  Yes, with all the Trump cases dropping away, there is no longer any need to appear 'unbiased' and 'evenhanded' regarding justice.  Nope, now there is no political cost to President Biden for pardoning his son.  Yeah, it may look bad in the history books, but family is family.

Now the real fun begins.  Soon, there will be stories in the media why this was the right thing to do, a noble thing to do, and mostly Trump's and/or Republicans' fault.  Karine Jean-Pierre, White House press secretary, is going to have a stressful day tomorrow.  Good luck.