• Not_mikey@slrpnk.net
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    2 hours ago

    To all the people in this thread claiming he needed to pardon him or trump would do something, without naming what that something is or using hyperbole, trump doesn’t care about hunter. The hunter case was about

    1. Dragging the Biden name through the dirt and making them seem like a crime family. They don’t need to do this anymore because Biden hasn’t been a threat to trump since that last debate. Its not like he’s afraid to run against him in 2028

    2. To call out them dems for there hypocrisy and try and make some equivalence with trumps convictions. This pardon plays perfectly into that narrative and now gives trump an excuse to pardon himself and all his accomplices.

    Hunter is of no use to the trump administration now, don’t try to sell this as anything but a powerful father bailing out his failure of a son.

    • Twinkly@lemm.ee
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      2 hours ago

      NOW gives him an excuse? Did you not hear of the 238 pardons Trump gave last time? He needed this to happen as an excuse to do that again this time around?

  • kreskin@lemmy.world
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    15 hours ago

    Its not the first time dems look indistinguishable from republicans (who are fascists) on Joe’s watch, is it.

    Biden is a guy who participated in obvious war crimes that 88% of his party didnt support-- as a democrat… And imperiously ignored the key issues of the campaign. Of course he’s going to pardon his shitty d-bag lobbyist son on the way out the door. Biden has lowered the bar for his party, for democracy, and for the entire western world order straight through the floor and deep into bedrock. We’ll need some sort of engineering miracle to ever even raise the bar up to ground level, much less hold it any higher anytime soon.

    • zenitsu@sh.itjust.works
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      12 hours ago

      Most of the country clearly stated that they don’t give a fuck about the law. Why should Biden insist on crucifying his son on some cringe gun ownership violation, while the government gets stacked with criminals? and you’re going to equate this to republicans? with Trump pardoning all his buddy cronies who committed crimes on his behalf? The criminal elect who tried to steal the 2020 election? Get the fuck out of here

      • kreskin@lemmy.world
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        4 hours ago

        Why should Biden insist on crucifying his son on some cringe gun ownership violation

        He’s not “crucifying his son”. His son is guilty of tax and gun crimes he clearly committed. If everyone lied on every government form, we couldnt have a country now could we.

        Get the fuck out of here

        Try to make me, troll.

        • zenitsu@sh.itjust.works
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          12 hours ago

          Good job ignoring most of my response while pretending you responded to anything of substance. Clown

  • Iheartcheese@lemmy.world
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    20 hours ago

    So this is his big Grand exit? He could do so much on the way out the door for the country but instead the senile old fuck only cares about his damn kid.

  • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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    21 hours ago

    Honestly? With the absolute thought crime aspect and the way the plea deal was handled, I don’t blame him one bit. There’s no public interest in locking up Hunter Biden.

    • kreskin@lemmy.world
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      15 hours ago

      There’s no public interest in locking up Hunter Biden.

      Nonsense. Theres a massive public interest in a privileged member of the political elite being held to the same legal standards and to the same due process as you and me.

      • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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        3 hours ago

        That’s not the same legal standards. Tax charges that the IRS bends over backwards not to use and gun charges that are literally thought crime and also very rarely used.

        This was the witch hunt the GOP cries wolf about. The original thing they were looking for was Ukrainian money deals.

        For anyone else the IRS would have had a payment plan and the gun charges would have been a plea deal. But we go from politically motivated investigation to politically motivated judge rejecting the plea deal

        What about this is the same due process we would have?

    • Cptn_Slow@lemmy.world
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      21 hours ago

      There’s no public interest in locking a lot of people up, yet they still do.

      Rules should be applied equally, regardless of who you or your parents are.

    • BMTea@lemmy.world
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      20 hours ago

      Yeah, I don’t see any public interest involved at all when it comes to the issue of presidents using their power to get their relatives off jail time. I don’t think it undermines the sense of justice and equality that all citizens are supposed to have if the “first among equal citizens” can get their crackhead middle ages son off of already lenient legal consequences for actions that others are serving hard time for. Not at all a conspicuous legal hole that undermines the concept of the rule of law, and definitely not open to abuse.

      • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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        20 hours ago

        That was part of the problem. The judge bowed to political pressure and rejected a completely normal plea deal to throw the book at the guy instead.

        If you ask me the pardon power isn’t used nearly enough.

        • BMTea@lemmy.world
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          20 hours ago

          Judges do that all the time. Hunter Biden was the 50+ year old son of one of the most powerful people in the country. Not some 22 year old street kid from a poor district.

            • Count042@lemmy.ml
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              19 hours ago

              They absolutely should.

              This isn’t some small point, either. Your view validates mandatory minimum sentencing and other systemically racist structures.

              Judges should make judgments. It’s literally the job title. A judge is someone you’re supposed to be able to trust to take into account all the human stuff and make decisions based off it.

              You want a judge that makes the judgment call that a plea deal is okay? Fine.

              You want a judge that throws away a plea deal they think is too light? Fine.

              You want a judge that adds up minimum sentences and could be replaced by a computer? Not fine.

              • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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                16 hours ago

                Yeah sure. And how many scandals are we seeing about judges? It’s obviously not fine. This isn’t the 1800’s any more and we need to stop giving someone that much power. If a plea deal is done between the state and a defendant them the judge’s only role should be to make sure the defendant isn’t being taken advantage of. The state hardly needs protection here and the precedent for political interference in the judicial system is really not okay.

                Life isn’t a Hollywood movie where the judge is some all knowing good intentioned white guy that always does the right thing. Our founding fathers understood this, that’s why they gave us what protections they could. Now over 200 years later we’ve forgotten it all. We even have debtor’s prison back, specifically with the help of the people you say are supposed to uphold trust in law and order.

                At this point I would rather a computer than read one more Pro Publica story about a judge taking kickbacks to send kids to torture camps.

                • Count042@lemmy.ml
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                  5 hours ago

                  You’re complaining about corruption in elected positions, and want to replace it by giving more power to the DA, or to remove the human aspect and give everything over a computer assigning mandatory minimums that only ever seem to go up.

                  If you have a problem with corruption, you fight the corruption. You don’t consolidate power into even fewer hands, with no mercy(not that there is much of that in the first place.)

                  The founding fathers were a bunch of rich white dudes, that almost to a one, fail every moral standard today. Some of them would and were considered assholes in their own time. Acting like they were incredibly thoughtful/wise elder statesmen is the only Hollywood trope either one of us has brought up. Part of the protections they did try and put into place was to spread power out, and make those positions ones that elected. You know, the stuff you want to remove?

            • BMTea@lemmy.world
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              20 hours ago

              Actually judges can and should call foul on plea deals that are poorly worded so as to allow future violations of tax law.

              • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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                19 hours ago

                A violation is a violation. A plea deal can’t make a future act not a crime. That’s completely nonsense.

  • Xanthrax@lemmy.world
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    20 hours ago

    Donald Trump has a hitlist. Hunter is on that list. I don’t think he deserves the pardon, but he needs it. Republicans will crucify him given the chance. I don’t really want to see Republicans holding his head up on a pike for all to see, as much as they’d love that.

    • Xerø@infosec.pub
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      13 hours ago

      I am pretty sure that Trump would have had that man killed in prison. In my books his dad did the right thing, fuck the optics.

  • IndustryStandard@lemmy.world
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    16 hours ago

    But Biden said he was the justice guy and he would not intervene!

    All the excuses to pardon Hunter out of “fear of Trump” could be used to excuse things that actually helped the public

    • Monument@lemmy.sdf.org
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      19 hours ago

      My hope of hopes is that this triggers a challenge and redefinition (and limitation) of presidential pardon powers.

      Buuuutt… I am not confident things would go in any way toward that direction. Probably the opposite. I can imagine it being redefined to some legally egregious bullshit, as is the custom of these times.
      Trump is gonna wind up with a stamp that reads “Presidential Pardon” and uses it with the abandon of a 3-year-old with a sticker book. He’s going to have a line of donors, stamping foreheads like it’s his own Ash Wednesday.

    • traches@sh.itjust.works
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      9 hours ago

      Liberal here, there is definitely a 2 tiered justice system in the US what are you even talking about

      Our disagreement is over the idea that somehow the billionaire with an army of lawyers, who appointed half the judges his cases are in front of, and has been given every conceivable affordance and courtesy, is anywhere other than the top of the privileged tier.

  • Squorlple@lemmy.world
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    20 hours ago

    Democrats aren’t exactly being a role model right now, but a lot of them are probably covering the asses of their own since Republicans are so blind by fascistic rage that they’re going to put a lot of innocent heads on pikes.

  • inclementimmigrant@lemmy.worldOP
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    21 hours ago

    Which, no fuck you Biden for pardoning your son. He committed multiple crimes, including gun laws and convicted in a fair trial.

    Fuck you for proving that there is a two tier Justice system.

    Fuck you for undermining gun control.

    Fuck you for giving yet another example that Democrats are no better than Republicans.

    • ERROR: Earth.exe has crashed@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      20 hours ago

      To be fair, I doubt he’d pardon hunter if Kalama won. Can you imagine what would happen to Hunter with DoJ under trump admin? Yes he did crimes, but crimes need to have proportional punishment, which I doubt trump admin is gonna be fair about it.

      Feeding your son to a felon president is a bad idea.

        • Count042@lemmy.ml
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          18 hours ago

          It’s really sad to me that the Portland community is moderated by a center right liberal.

            • Count042@lemmy.ml
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              4 hours ago

              Yeah, cause there is anyone left wing on the city council and like we haven’t had a succession of center right Democrats that used to be republicans as mayors.

              The city is the way it is under leadership that aligns with your politics.

              The city we have is the city we get if you get everything you want politically. It’s literally your mess.

      • inclementimmigrant@lemmy.worldOP
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        20 hours ago

        Hunter Biden was scheduled to be sentenced on Dec. 12 for his conviction on federal gun charges. He also was set to be sentenced on Dec. 16 in a separate criminal case in which he pleaded guilty to federal tax evasion charges in September.

        Trump’s absolutely screwed up Justice department would have had nothing to do with the sentencing.

        • ERROR: Earth.exe has crashed@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          20 hours ago

          Did you know, unlike a Jury’s “non-guilty” verdict, court sentencing can be appealed?

          If the prosecution believes the sentence to be too light, they can appeal and request a heavier sentence.

          Also, there are many more ways a weaponized DoJ can mess with its prisoners. if epstein got killed under trump admin, who’s to say it can’t happen to others, regardless of if they are as terrible as epstein or not.

          • inclementimmigrant@lemmy.worldOP
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            19 hours ago

            Oh for fucks sake, you think that Epstein was killed by the Trump admin? Get out of here with that conspiracy theory BS.

            And no a prosecutor can’t just say “oh it’s to light” and a judge just grants it. There had to be legal basis behind it like sentencing below the minimum mandated sentence and even the most shitty judges aren’t looking to undermine the other judges and the system unlike what is happening here.

            But whatever, you can all be go sports team with this and downvote away but you’re just proving what regular Americans think, even if it’s not, that both sides are the same with this.

      • inclementimmigrant@lemmy.worldOP
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        20 hours ago

        Yeah, I also agree but as you can see, people still treat this crap as a team sport instead of treating everyone equally under the law.

        I mean hell, how are we supposed to say fuck the trump family for all their shady, illegal behavior with taxes and prosecute them when Democrats are pardoning a tax evader and making excuses when he did do those things regardless of political bullshit.

    • jordanlund@lemmy.worldM
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      20 hours ago

      https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/legal-experts-say-charges-hunter-biden-are-rarely-brought-rcna90191

      “It insults the intelligence of the American people to compare misdemeanor tax charges to a scheme to steal Top Secret documents and obstruct justice when the government asked for them back,” he tweeted, comparing the charges against Hunter Biden to the recent federal indictment against former President Donald Trump. “If anything, Hunter Biden was treated harshly — those crimes are rarely charged.”

    • Tinidril@midwest.social
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      20 hours ago

      and convicted in a fair trial.

      To be fair, that’s kinda just what pardons are for.

      I almost want to give Hunter a break because he never would have even been charged if his dad wasn’t President. Then I remember how he misused his father’s status for personal gain. I figure that takes the first issue off the table.

    • shalafi@lemmy.world
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      20 hours ago

      WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — Hunter Biden was convicted Tuesday of all three felony charges related to the purchase of a revolver in 2018 when, prosecutors argued, the president’s son lied on a mandatory gun-purchase form by saying he was not illegally using or addicted to drugs.

      Lying on an ATF Form 4473 is almost never prosecuted because much of the language is wishy-washy. Ever filled one out?

      The odds of being charged for lying on the form are virtually nonexistent. In the 2019 fiscal year, when Hunter Biden purchased his gun, federal prosecutors received 478 referrals for lying on Form 4473 — and filed just 298 cases. The numbers were roughly similar for fiscal 2020. At issue is when Biden answered “no” on the question that asks about unlawful drug use and addiction when purchasing a gun.

      https://www.ncja.org/crimeandjusticenews/few-prosecutions-for-lying-on-atf-gun-purchase-form

      How’s that moral high horse ride for ya? Winning any elections? No?

  • cogitase@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    20 hours ago

    All the other cases where they sentenced someone with a federal gun charge for lying on the form were plea deals. ABC said they couldn’t find any instances of someone being charged and convicted on that charge alone. You can’t say this wasn’t a politically motivated prosecution when the charge has never been used that way before.

  • AgentDalePoopster@lemmy.world
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    20 hours ago

    So his lame duck period is even more full-throated support for Israel and pardoning his own failson. He could, like, do anything at all that helps people. Any sort of progressive, popular idea that would actually benefit Americans. Hell, even if he failed it would do wonders for his legacy. He could try to do something, anything, to start making up for dragging down the entire party by refusing to drop out earlier, or allow for an actual primary. But nah. Pardons for Hunter.

    • ShinkanTrain@lemmy.ml
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      20 hours ago

      If he or the other ghouls wanted to do anything that benefits working people they would have done it when they could get votes for it.