Hunter Biden and the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (BSVA): A Plethora of Misleading Attorneys Have Their Own Lawful Progenitors

More obnoxious is the hypocrisy. Every year, federal prosecutors file hundreds of cases against persons charged with lying on the Firearms Transaction Record, or Form 4473, which is required from anyone buying a firearm from a licensed gun dealer. In 1993, Senator Biden made that a key part of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act. How is it that the same president who made both gun control and stricter tax enforcement key parts of his political message suddenly sees his own son’s transgressions as nuisance offenses?

For his part, Hunter Biden was hardly shy about telling the people around him that he wanted — needed — a pardon, although it is unclear how often he had discussed the matter directly with his father before this past week. The president, even before he made the decision to issue a pardon, made it clear that he did not want to see his son serve a single day behind bars.

Mr. Biden wanted to define his presidency in different ways from the first Trump years. With the pardon of his son, Mr. Biden added his name to a roll call of presidents who have misused the pardon power. By changing his plan to issue this pardon, Mr. Biden himself seemed to recognize how wrong it was, and is.

Mr. Biden stopped running for president by late July. Hunter Biden was going to go to trial in Los Angeles when he pleaded guilty in September. Vice President Harris lost the election to Mr. Trump. And Mr. Biden, now an 82-year-old lame-duck, single-term president, had been following the news, watching as Mr. Trump vowed to stock his administration with a vengeful cast of characters who would use the judicial system to punish political opponents.

It was at that point Mr. Biden, who was, among other things, deeply concerned that the pressure of the trials would push his son into a relapse after years of sobriety, began to realize there might not be any way out beyond issuing a pardon. It appears that there was never serious consideration of anything short of a full pardon, such as a commutation of his sentence, they said.

Presidents do not necessarily have to issue a single pardon, nor are they limited in the number or to whom they issue them. They reveal their roots in the royal prerogative of mercy. There is only one reason presidents, or kings, issue pardons: because they want to.