President Joe Biden is committed to not pardoning his son, Hunter Biden, in either of his two criminal matters.
The president previously said he had no plans to intervene in his son’s sentencing, and White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre faced a number of questions on the subject Thursday during the first press briefing following the 2024 election.
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“We’ve been asked that question multiple times,” Jean-Pierre told reporters when asked about Hunter Biden’s sentencing next month. “Our answer stands, which is no.”
When pressed to clarify if Joe Biden might commute his son’s sentence, as opposed to issuing a pardon, Jean-Pierre again said, “No.”
“That’s not what we’re going to do,” she said. “That stands”
Hunter Biden was found guilty on three gun-related charges over the summer, though his sentencing date has yet to be set in that matter. The president’s son is set to be sentenced on Dec. 17 after pleading guilty to federal tax charges and is facing a maximum sentence of nearly 20 years in prison.
Some have suggested that President-elect Donald Trump should intervene in Hunter Biden’s criminal matters as a means of extending an olive branch to Democrats.
“President Trump should pardon Hunter Biden,” commentator Piers Morgan wrote Thursday morning on X. “That would go a long way to setting the right tone for bringing a very divided America back together again.”
Trump himself told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt in October that he would not take a pardon or commuted sentence for the younger Biden “off the books.”
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“See, unlike Joe Biden, despite what they’ve done to me, where they’ve gone after me so viciously, despite what, and Hunter’s a bad boy,” Trump said on Oct. 24. “There’s no question about it. He’s been a bad boy. All you had to do is see the laptop from hell. But I happen to think it’s very bad for our country.”
Thursday’s briefing can be seen in full below.