Trump raises eyebrows noting Joe Biden didn’t pardon himself — and ‘it all had to do with him’

By New York Post (Politics) | Created at 2025-01-22 23:31:25 | Updated at 2025-01-23 03:17:35 3 hours ago
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WASHINGTON — President Trump generated intrigue Wednesday by noting that former President Joe Biden didn’t pardon himself as he left office, despite pardoning his siblings and their spouses to head off further inquiries into the family’s business dealings.

“This guy went around giving everybody pardons,” Trump, 78, told Fox News’ Sean Hannity in his first TV interview since reclaiming power.

“And you know what the funny thing, maybe the sad thing, is he didn’t give himself a pardon. And you if look at it, it all had to do with him,” the 47th president added, potentially leaving the door open to future prosecutions.

President Trump blasted what he called a “corrupt establishment” during his inaugural address Monday — as outgoing President Joe Biden watched. AP

Biden, 82, issued pardons minutes before leaving office Monday to his brothers James and Frank Biden and his sister Valerie Owens, as well as to the spouses of James and Valerie.

The now-former president said in his final days in office that he wouldn’t be pardoning himself because “I didn’t do anything wrong,” though he had said the same of his family members.

“The issuance of these pardons should not be mistaken as an acknowledgment that they engaged in any wrongdoing, nor should acceptance be misconstrued as an admission of guilt for any offense,” his statement read.

Then-Vice President Joe Biden is pictured with his son Hunter and his Kazakhstani associates. KIAR

James Biden, 75, for decades leveraged his brother’s powerful roles as a senator and vice president to lure domestic and international business — in many cases partnering with Joe’s son Hunter, 54, whom the outgoing president pardoned on Dec. 1 as he awaited sentencing for gun and tax crimes.

It’s unclear if Joe Biden’s role in foreign dealings will be investigated by the Trump Justice Department, though some theoretical offenses, such as possible infractions under the Foreign Agents Registration Act, have a five-year statute of limitations and would not be chargeable.

It’s rare for a former president to face a criminal investigation or charges — however, Biden’s Justice Department in 2023 indicted Trump in a pair of cases after his first term for allegedly mishandling classified documents and for challenging the results of the 2020 election.

Then-VP Biden is pictured with his son’s associates from Chinese state-backed BHR Partners. National Archives

Biden, like Trump, was investigated for mishandling classified documents — with files from his vice presidency and Senate tenure found at his Delaware home and a DC office. Special counsel Robert Hur declined to prosecute him last year, citing a jury’s likely perception of an “elderly man with poor memory.”

It’s unclear if Hur’s decision could be revisited, or if any possible criminal charges could stem from Biden’s role in his family’s dealings.

Biden’s pardons of his family members granted sweeping reprieves for conduct dating to 2014 — and some crimes do have 10-year statues of limitation that conceivably could be in play. For example, wire fraud can have a decade-long deadline for criminal charges.

Biden is pictured at the vice president’s residence hosting his son’s Mexican associates.

Joe Biden met with his relatives’ business associates from two Chinese-government linked ventures and with associates from Kazakhstan, Mexico, Russia and Ukraine, according to witness testimony, emails and even photographs.

Trump cited documents from Hunter’s abandoned laptop to question whether Joe Biden was a “corrupt politician” at the final debate of the 2020 election.

Laptop records showed that Joe dined as vice president with an executive of a Ukrainian gas company paying his son $1 million a year and that he was penciled in for a 10% cut of a joint venture with a Chinese energy company that paid Hunter and James millions.

Later disclosures revealed that Hunter threatened his father’s wrath in a July 2017 text message to a Chinese associate if an agreed upon deal wasn’t fulfilled — and that within 10 days $5.1 million flowed from the entity to bank accounts associated with Hunter and James Biden.

Biden’s Justice Department was accused by a pair of IRS whistleblowers of orchestrating a wide-reaching coverup of a tax fraud investigation of Hunter Biden, including heading off the pursuit of leads implicating the president.

Congressional Republicans also subpoenaed bank records showing that James Biden transferred $240,000 to his elder brother — that James said were personal loan repayments. The GOP-led House Oversight Committee said the flow of funds showed that $40,000 came from China.

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