White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre revealed Friday that a top Democrat played an important behind-the-scenes role in convincing President Joe Biden to pardon his son Hunter.
In her first televised press conference since the pardon, Jean-Pierre pulled back the curtain on how the decision was made, explaining that Biden had “wrestled” with it before the bombshell announcement dropped last Sunday.
“It was not an easy thing for him to decide,” said Jean-Pierre.
When pressed on the fact that Biden had previously said he would not pardon his son, Jean-Pierre said South Carolina Rep. Jim Clyburn, one of Biden’s closest allies in Congress, was a deciding influence on the president’s thinking.
Clyburn had admitted on CNN earlier this week that he had “urged” Biden to pardon Hunter when the pair spoke two weeks earlier, though he said that the president was “reticent.”
In emphasizing Clyburn’s role, Jean-Pierre seemed to acknowledge Clyburn’s cachet, having breathed life into Biden’s 2020 presidential campaign with an endorsement—which helped Biden secure a primary victory in South Carolina.
“That was a conversation that the congressman himself had with the president two weeks ago,” Jean-Pierre said. “He said that the president was reticent when he encouraged the president to do so. And this weekend, [Biden] thought about it, and weighed. It was not an easy decision to come to.”
As reporters continued to grill about the pardon, Jean-Pierre repeatedly called back to the conversation between Clyburn and Biden.
Clyburn said on CNN that he made the recommendation to Biden because he felt that the legal system was treating Hunter Biden unfairly.
“If Hunter had gone through a process like everybody else had gone through, I would not have this feeling,” Clyburn said. “But when you get prosecuted because you did not fill out a form to get a gun that you never used—that was even taken away and thrown away—and then you get prosecuted for it to make it felonious. That, to me, is a problem.”
Hunter Biden was awaiting sentencing on two separate convictions—one for improperly filling out a form to purchase a gun and the other for tax evasion.
Biden had often said in the past, as his son’s cases worked their way through the legal system, that he would not pardon him—even if he was convicted. However, the president reversed course, citing the same rationale as Clyburn—that Hunter had been politically targeted.
“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,” said Biden in a statement about the pardon.
He added, “In trying to break Hunter, they’ve tried to break me — and there’s no reason to believe it will stop here. Enough is enough.”
