The prosecutor who led lengthy investigations into US President Joe Biden’s son defended his efforts in a report released Monday, saying the criminal charges against Hunter Biden were the culmination of “careful and impartial” work and a “non-partisan policy”.
Special counsel David Weiss’ report also criticized senior Biden for slandering the Justice Department when he pardoned his son in December. In a statementthe president said he believed his son had been treated “differently” because of his last name.
“Other presidents have pardoned family members, but in doing so, none have taken the opportunity to slander Justice Department officials based solely on false accusations,” the report read Monday. Weiss report.
“These baseless accusations have no basis and their repetition threatens the integrity of the judicial system as a whole,” continued the prosecutor.
“The President’s characterizations are incorrect based on the facts of this case, and at a more fundamental level, they are wrong.”
The document, as is customary for reports prepared by Justice Department special counsels, provides a summary of the investigation’s findings. But he stands out most for his strong defense of the team’s work and his open criticism of the president over the written statement he issued when pardoning Hunter Biden last month.
Biden had repeatedly promised he would not pardon his son but course reversed on December 1stsaying such action was justified due to what he called a “miscarriage of justice” and selective prosecution. He said he believed his son had been treated “differently” because of his last name and that “raw politics” had infected the Justice Department’s decision-making process.
“No reasonable person looking at the facts of Hunter’s cases can come to any conclusion other than this: Hunter was chosen solely because he is my son – and that is wrong,” Biden said.
“The president’s characterizations are incorrect”
Weiss served as U.S. Attorney for Delaware during the Trump administration and was retained in the position by U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland before being appointed to the special counsel position in 2023.
He took issue with Biden’s comments and noted that the justices also rejected that assessment.
“The President’s characterizations are incorrect based on the facts of this case and, at a more fundamental level, they are false,” Weiss wrote. He also noted: “These prosecutions were the culmination of thorough and impartial investigations, not partisan politics. »
US President Joe Biden has pardoned his son Hunter, shielding him from prison on federal gun and tax convictions, despite his earlier promises to avoid using presidential powers to benefit the family.
The investigations, which Hunter Biden himself revealed in 2020 when he revealed that prosecutors were looking into his taxes, took a tortuous path to resolution between Justice Department leaders from both political parties.
He was expected to enter a plea in 2023 to a federal gun charge, but the deal collapsed spectacularly after a last-minute disagreement between his lawyers and federal prosecutors.
He was tried in Delaware last year and was convicted of three federal crimes who accused him of lying on a required gun purchase form by claiming he was not illegally using drugs or addicted to drugs.
Describing the younger Biden as a “Yale-educated lawyer and businessman,” Weiss said he realized he was lying in 2018 when he filled out the federal form to buy his gun and indicated he didn’t. was not a drug user.
“But he did it anyway, because he wanted to own a gun, even though he was actively using crack,” Weiss wrote.
Hunter Biden subsequently entered a surprise guilty plea last September to federal tax charges, avoiding a trial that would have presented potentially lurid evidence in addition to the salacious and unflattering details about his personal life aired during his previous trial in the Delaware.
The president’s claims that Hunter Biden had been mistreated by the criminal justice system echoed, in some ways, the arguments of the younger Biden’s legal team, which had claimed that prosecutors bowed to political pressure to indict Hunter after the collapse of what Trump and other Republicans called a “sweetheart.” ” plea agreement.
That’s not the case, Weiss said.
“Far from being selective, these prosecutions embody the equal application of justice: no matter who you are or what your last name is, you are subject to the same laws as everyone else in the United States,” Weiss said .
