Biden says he will not pardon Hunter, will respect son’s trial verdicts

President Joe Biden pledged not to pardon his son Hunter Biden as he faces a federal gun crimes trial in Delaware.

During an interview in Normandy, France, where Joe Biden is commemorating the 80th anniversary of D-Day, the president provided a one-word response when asked by ABC whether he had ruled out using his clemency powers in the two federal cases against his son, the other relating to alleged tax evasion.

“Yes,” Joe Biden told the network, according to excerpts before the interview airs in its entirety Thursday night.

Hunter Biden is on trial in Delaware on charges he lied on paperwork to obtain a firearm and illegally carried the weapon despite being addicted to drugs. He has also been indicted in California on nine additional tax-related counts, including tax evasion, with those proceedings expected to start in September.

World News Tonight anchor David Muir, too, asked Joe Biden whether he would respect the verdicts in Hunter Biden’s trials.

“Yes,” Joe Biden said.

But Joe Biden took the opportunity to criticize former President Donald Trump, his 2024 Republican opponent, for not doing the same in his hush money trial. Last week, a New York jury found Trump guilty on 34 counts of falsifying business records to allegedly cover up an extramarital affair with porn star Stormy Daniels before the 2016 election.

“He’s trying to undermine it,” Joe Biden said. “He got a fair trial. The jury spoke.”

Abroad, Joe Biden underscored that his decision last week to permit Ukraine to use U.S.-made weapons in Russia was not an authorization for “strikes on Moscow, on the Kremlin.” There had been calls for Joe Biden to make the decision as Russia makes inroads in its war against its neighbor.

“They’re authorized to be used in proximity to the border when they’re being used on the other side of the border to attack specific targets in Ukraine,” Joe Biden said. “We’re not authorizing strikes 200 miles into Russia.” 

“I’ve known him for over 40 years,” he added of Russian President Vladimir Putin. “He’s concerned me for 40 years. He’s not a decent man. … He’s a dictator, and he’s struggling to make sure he holds his country together while still keeping this assault going.”

Regarding the Gaza war, Joe Biden reiterated that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, with whom he has had a fractious relationship, is “listening” to him as Israel and the terrorist organization Hamas restart ceasefire negotiations. Both Joe Biden and Netanyahu are under domestic political pressure to end the war because of the humanitarian situation in Gaza, though Netanyahu is simultaneously under scrutiny from hard-line Republicans to destroy Hamas.

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Biden, 81, may be the last U.S. president who was born before D-Day to mark the anniversary of the military operation that precipitated the end of World War II. After his trip to France, he is scheduled to travel to Italy for the 50th Group of Seven summit.

“They saved the world,” Joe Biden said of those who participated in the largest seaborne invasion in history. “We can never let anybody forget what they did and why they did it.”