Hunter Biden’s federal gun case in Delaware was officially terminated on Tuesday after President Joe Biden, his father, issued a sweeping pardon for his crimes.
U.S. District Judge Maryellen Noreika, who presided over the case, declared that “all proceedings in this case are hereby terminated” while citing the unprecedented nature of the blanket pardon, which covers a broad range of offenses over a decade-long time period.
However, the judge stopped short of dismissing the indictment outright.
The pardon, issued on Sunday, protects Hunter from prosecution for crimes committed between January 1, 2014, and December 1, 2024. President Biden defended his action in a statement, saying, “No reasonable person who looks at the facts of Hunter’s cases can reach any other conclusion than Hunter was singled out only because he is my son – and that is wrong.”
The president’s decision was met with criticism from Democrats and Republicans who criticized Biden for continually lying about his intention to pardon his son. He stated repeatedly that he would not take such an action and has insisted on multiple occasions that nobody should be above the law.
Prosecutors from Special Counsel David Weiss’ office argued that Hunter’s case be terminated instead of dismissed outright because there should still be a public record of his crime.
Weiss’ team noted that “courts do not dismiss indictments when pardons are granted” and that in pardons granted by former Presidents Obama and Trump, “the United States District Court for the Central District of California has not dismissed the indictment.”
Specifically, as to whether a pardon must, as the defendant wrongly claims, result in the dismissal of an indictment, the D.C. Circuit decision in In re North, explains why it does not:
An indictment establishes probable cause that the accused has committed a crime. Guilt can be established only by a much higher standard, proof beyond a reasonable doubt.
Because a pardon does not blot out guilt or expunge a judgment of conviction, one can conclude that a pardon does not blot out probable cause of guilt or expunge an indictment.
The president’s pardon is so controversial that even Democrats are criticizing it. In a recent segment of “The Daily Show,” host Jon Stewart slammed Biden for pardoning his son and mocked the Democrats who are defending it.
Even Jon Stewart admits that Hunter’s pardon stretching back 11 years is quite fishy:
Jon Stewart: “Faith in the rule of law: Finally, Democrats have a moral perch for which they can judge without shame hypocrisy or nuance.”
Jessica Dean: “Breaking news, President Biden has… pic.twitter.com/NHwKEL7dLr— Eric Abbenante (@EricAbbenante) December 3, 2024
CNN’s Jake Tapper also criticized the president for constantly lying about pardoning Hunter. “President Biden lying about this, of course, makes others in his administration and allies either credulous or complicit, including White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, who‘s been saying this for months to the American people,” he said on Monday.
