Pardoning Hunter Biden will have a 'significant impact' on President Biden's legacy, writer says
National Review senior writer Noah Rothman discusses Americans' reactions to President Biden pardoning his son Hunter on 'The Story.'
CNN contributor and Watergate figure John Dean is urging President Biden to expand his pardon list to sink any prospect of President-elect Donald Trump getting "revenge" against his political enemies.
In a post on social media site Bluesky, Dean advised Biden to issue a "blanket pardon" for DOJ officials who have investigated or prosecuted Trump so he can’t punish them once he gets into office.
"Biden should keep going with his pardons: Trump, Jack Smith & team, Mueller & team, and a blanket pardon for all on Trump’s enemies list for any and all political statements before December 25, 2024! Merry Christmas," Dean wrote on Sunday.
Dean’s post came shortly after Biden announced that he pardoned his son, Hunter, who was facing potentially significant prison time for federal tax evasion and gun convictions.
John Dean, former counsel to President Nixon, advised President Biden to pardon all of President-elect Trump's political enemies so he can't exact "revenge" on them when he gets back into office.
In announcing the pardon, the president criticized what he deemed the unfair investigation and prosecution of his son, a process he said was "infected" by politics and led to a "miscarriage of justice."
"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," President Biden said in a statement Sunday.
After Hunter Biden’s pardon, the judge in his firearms case terminated the remainder of the proceedings. His sentencing date had been scheduled for Dec. 12.
President Biden broke his own repeated pledge that he wouldn't pardon Hunter with the move.
Dean, who was former President Nixon’s White House counsel during the Watergate scandal, wrote that pardoning Trump’s enemies could be a way to "take the wind out of retribution/revenge!"
BORDER STATE OFFERS TRUMP MASSIVE PLOT OF LAND TO AID MASS DEPORTATION OPERATION
President Biden and son Hunter Biden (BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP via Getty Images)
Dean's "retribution" line was a reference to Trump telling supporters at CPAC in 2023, "I am your warrior. I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed: I am your retribution."
Critics have expressed fears that once the president-elect returns to office, he will use his power to get back at those who launched and cooperated in investigations and prosecutions of him during his presidency and beyond.
Trump posted in September, "WHEN I WIN, those people that CHEATED will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the Law, which will include long-term prison sentences so that this Depravity of Justice does not happen again."
However, in several other appearances during and after his 2024 presidential campaign, Trump has softened this rhetoric and even extended grace to his most ardent critics.
During an interview with Fox News Channel host Sean Hannity in June, Trump said those worried about retribution are "wrong."
"No. 1, they're wrong. It has to stop, because otherwise we're not going to have a country," he told Hannity, but he added that "based on what they've done, I would have every right to go after them."
President-elect Donald Trump (Rebecca Noble/Getty Images)
Dean has been an outspoken critic of Trump, even testifying against him in 2019 during a Democrat-led congressional hearing about then-Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report on allegations of Trump-Russia collusion. The Watergate lawyer has also previously referred to Trump as an "authoritarian president" on social media.
Dean has long been a favorite voice of the progressive media for his criticism of the Republican Party and constant invocation of Watergate to hype up GOP scandals.
Dean was a key figure in the Watergate prosecution efforts that led to Nixon's resignation. Dean served a short prison sentence after pleading guilty to obstruction of justice for his role in the cover-up and was disbarred.
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Fox News Digital's Breanne Deppisch contributed to this report.
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