The Hunter Biden Investigation

[Alefroth]

I wouldn't count on this pardon doing anything to protect him after Jan 20. It wouldn't surprise me to see the DoJ/FBI trump up some new charges against him and railroad him straight into a supermax. It isn't like anyone will stop them, certainly not the Trump Supreme Court.

Cotton has already claimed Hunter couldn't plead the 5th any more.

[LawBeefaroni]

I wouldn't count on this pardon doing anything to protect him after Jan 20. It wouldn't surprise me to see the DoJ/FBI trump up some new charges against him and railroad him straight into a supermax. It isn't like anyone will stop them, certainly not the Trump Supreme Court.

They wouldn't want the optics of jailing a president's son, would they?

They care about optics?

[Alefroth]

I wouldn't count on this pardon doing anything to protect him after Jan 20. It wouldn't surprise me to see the DoJ/FBI trump up some new charges against him and railroad him straight into a supermax. It isn't like anyone will stop them, certainly not the Trump Supreme Court.

They wouldn't want the optics of jailing a president's son, would they?

They care about optics?

They do not.

[Max Peck]

I wouldn't count on this pardon doing anything to protect him after Jan 20. It wouldn't surprise me to see the DoJ/FBI trump up some new charges against him and railroad him straight into a supermax. It isn't like anyone will stop them, certainly not the Trump Supreme Court.

They wouldn't want the optics of jailing a president's son, would they?

Have you met the MAGA base? They'll insist on it.

Besides which, they've spent the last few years trying to jail a sitting president's son. Why would they blush at the idea of jailing an (illegitimate) ex-president's son.

[Alefroth]

They wouldn't.

[El Guapo]

I wouldn't count on this pardon doing anything to protect him after Jan 20. It wouldn't surprise me to see the DoJ/FBI trump up some new charges against him and railroad him straight into a supermax. It isn't like anyone will stop them, certainly not the Trump Supreme Court.

Cotton has already claimed Hunter couldn't plead the 5th any more.

That is true - you legally cannot have a reasonable fear of criminal prosecution (required to assert the 5th amendment) regarding conduct for which you have a full pardon (and so can't be criminally prosecuted). That is more about a fantasy prosecution of Joe Biden, though, not about going after Hunter.

Though I suppose as to Hunter it's plausible that they might subpoena him, ask him who "the big guy" is, and then prosecute him for perjury when he (presumably) says that it's not referring to Joe Biden.

[Alefroth]

He's still free to claim, 'I do not recall' though.

[El Guapo]

He's still free to claim, 'I do not recall' though.

That is correct.

I will also say as someone who has taken a number of depositions on behalf of the government I have long fantasized about prosecuting someone for perjury based upon completely implausible assertions of lack of memory, but it has yet to be presented in a feasible way.

[Anonymous Bosch]

Hunter Biden’s Pardon: Your Tax Dollars At Work

Ordinary Americans are held accountable when they defraud the IRS. Not the president’s son.

The White House’s story on Hunter Biden keeps changing. The president supposedly had no knowledge of his son’s business, then no involvement in it, then no financial benefit from it. The goal posts moved as more facts came to light. Before the election, Joe Biden promised he would respect the legal process and issue no pardon or commutation to his son. This week he went much further than pre-emptively commuting any sentence to keep his son from prison. He issued a broad pardon for any and all crimes over a nearly 11-year period.

He gave his son the sweeping immunity to which career prosecutors refused to agree as part of an aborted plea deal. When that deal collapsed in July 2023, Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed a special counsel. Despite his testimony to Congress in March 2023 that Delaware U.S. Attorney David Weiss had full authority over the matter, Mr. Garland granted special charging authority to Mr. Weiss.

These dizzying narrative shifts happened because the two of us blew the whistle and exposed the preferential treatment the Biden Justice Department gave to a powerful political family. Our story never changed—because we told the truth.

President Biden’s pardon is an insult to every honest taxpaying American. He claimed that his own Justice Department unfairly targeted his son. On the contrary, we produced mountains of evidence and testified under oath about the machinations his Justice Department, including Mr. Weiss, used to shield the Biden family from a thorough investigation of alleged corruption in Ukraine, Romania and China.

This year, a jury found Hunter Biden guilty of federal gun charges in Delaware and he pleaded guilty to willful tax felonies in California. The president’s letter falsely suggests that his son was merely late in filing and paying his taxes because of serious addictions. He wrote that in such cases, when back taxes are paid with penalties and interest, they are often resolved without criminal penalties, but his son was treated differently. That’s malarkey.

The American people need to know, and the president’s letter omits, that Hunter Biden admitted to intentional felony tax evasion—criminal charges for which ordinary Americans are held accountable every day. Hunter Biden admitted that he filed false tax returns with the Internal Revenue Service—knowingly and willfully, while sober. False deductions taken on his tax return contradicted statements he made in his memoir, which he wrote while sober. These false deductions included things like a sex-club membership, luxury vehicle rentals, and house rentals for his then-girlfriend.

Ordinary Americans are routinely held accountable for that kind of tax fraud, but Hunter Biden will escape accountability because his father is president.

Joe Biden’s letter doesn’t mention that his broad pardon also absolves his son of any other crime in the past decade that the Justice Department didn’t fully investigate. In a public filing in August, special counsel Weiss’s office alleged that Hunter Biden “agreed to attempt to influence U.S. public policy” on behalf of a Romanian businessman but didn’t charge Mr. Biden with a violation of the Foreign Agents Registration Act.

The dishonesty that has infected the Washington political class must stop, and the bureaucrats in the Justice Department and IRS who have abused their power and acted unethically ought to be held accountable.

The constant retaliation against us as whistleblowers should cease, and those responsible should be held to account. Nonprofit efforts such as DefendWhistleblowers.com are helping. Without serious reform and major changes in personnel and policy, something like this will happen again. We will keep our oaths as sworn federal law-enforcement officers, stand up for fair and equal treatment of every taxpayer, and speak out against improper politicization of the Justice Department.

Messrs. Ziegler and Shapley are IRS special agents.

[pr0ner]

Yawn.

[Isgrimnur]

The dishonesty that has infected the Washington political class must stop,

[Holman]

Hunter Biden’s Pardon: Your Tax Dollars At Work

Righteous indignation over this pardon is going to seem fucking ridiculous after Trump's inauguration.

[Grifman]

I have no problem with these potential pardons being discussed within Biden’s admin:



https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/ ... s-00192610

[Alefroth]

What a timeline we are in.

[Smoove_B]

What a timeline we are in.

It's insane. The idea that Dr. Fauci would need a pardon? I can't even comprehend it, but yeah in this timeline it's probably necessary. Good to see the administration is taking very seriously what's about to happen.

[$iljanus]

Hunter Biden’s Pardon: Your Tax Dollars At Work

Righteous indignation over this pardon is going to seem fucking ridiculous after Trump's inauguration.

Yeah Hunter got pardoned because the fucking Visigoths are at the gates and when they get in they're going to go on their revenge tour. So fuck off WSJ.

[El Guapo]

It is unfortunate that it makes sense to consider this.

[GreenGoo]

What a timeline we are in.

It's insane. The idea that Dr. Fauci would need a pardon? I can't even comprehend it, but yeah in this timeline it's probably necessary. Good to see the administration is taking very seriously what's about to happen.

I vaguely recall the Italians charging various scientists for failing to detect an earthquake. So. There's that.

[Isgrimnur]

Charged, convicted, ...

[GreenGoo]

headline in the link URL says cleared

edit: Ah. Different dude.

[Blackhawk]

The dishonesty that has infected the Washington political class must stop

The time for that was a month ago.

[LordMortis]

The dishonesty that has infected the Washington political class must stop

The time for that was a month ago.

The time for it is now moving forward. The time to scream it from the rooftops nonstop, every day until November 2024 at the very least and take heed of the warning was January 7th 2020. Raising the alarm against this outgoing administration, at this particular moment? Hard for me to brandish a pitchfork.

[Max Peck]

This pretty much encapsulates why I don't see a problem with the pardon.

[Alefroth]

I have a feeling Trump will challenge or try to overturn the pardon.

[Blackhawk]

The dishonesty that has infected the Washington political class must stop

The time for that was a month ago.

The time for it is now moving forward.

I was referring more to the hypocrisy that in the right calling for an end to dishonesty in Washington right after electing Trump.

[Kraken]

I have a feeling Trump will challenge or try to overturn the pardon.

Not if doing so might compromise the future immunity of his own hive of scum and villainy. If trump lives to the end of his term he's going to have a very long list of criminal minions and lackeys.

[Alefroth]

I mean Hunter's specifically.

[Kraken]

Overturning Hunter's pardon would require a SCOTUS ruling that would necessarily dilute the pardon power, which is effectively unlimited now. I think trump wants to keep it that way.

[Max Peck]

They don't need to overturn the pardon, just trump up some new charges that the pardon doesn't cover.

[Alefroth]

They don't need to overturn the pardon, just trump up some new charges that the pardon doesn't cover.

They don't need, but I wouldn't put it past them.

[Alefroth]

Overturning Hunter's pardon would require a SCOTUS ruling that would necessarily dilute the pardon power, which is effectively unlimited now. I think trump wants to keep it that way.

Yeah, I don't put much faith in norms anymore.

[Isgrimnur]

[Alefroth]