Preemptive Pardons for Presumed Persecution Differ From Protecting the Guilty From Rightful Prosecution
Preemptive pardons are rare. On some level, they are always controversial, since the idea of a pardon is to emancipate someone who has been convicted of a crime. A preemptive pardon emancipates someone who has not yet been convicted.
The precedent for any pardon will always be scrutinized and rightfully so, and those reasons can justifiably be weighed on the scale of right or wrong. Although those scales can be seen as relative, there are always baselines that can be applied that clarify what was taking place.
Throughout history, there have been some notable pardons that have sparked controversy. This is to be expected, as opinions will always vary. In 1974, President Gerald Ford granted former President Richard Nixon a “full, free, and absolute pardon” for any crimes he may have committed against the United States during his time in office. This decision effectively halted any potential criminal trials related to the Watergate scandal.
The circumstances surrounding Watergate have always been murky, and it’s generally accepted that Nixon’s resigned because of his role in the cover-up of the break-in.
Nixon was a highly complex individual. While he was indeed volatile and paranoid, he also demonstrated qualities of a true statesman. His significant accomplishments were overshadowed by his involvement in the Watergate scandal, but those achievements were still noteworthy. Even those who disliked Nixon’s gruff and at times arrogant leadership style acknowledged that he was an effective president.
Ford was faced with a difficult decision regarding Nixon. Despite his achievements, Nixon had experienced the ultimate humiliation of becoming the first president in U.S. history to resign from office. Given these complex circumstances, Ford decided it would be best to grant him a pardon in order to spare the country the prolonged suffering that a trial would bring.
In 1977, Jimmy Carter granted a blanket preemptive amnesty to thousands of men who had evaded the Vietnam War draft between August 4, 1964, and March 28, 1973. Again, the decision was difficult. According to U.S. Department of Defense statistics, the United States military suffered 58,220 total in-theater deaths, and another 303,704 American Soldiers were wounded.
From the start, the war was met with disdain. While U.S. forces were engaged in combat, daily protests erupted across the nation. Many people believed—and still believe—that we had no business being involved and that it was not our fight. Compounding the issue were the evident psychological effects experienced by numerous veterans upon their return. Additionally, many of those who came back were often looked down upon for having participated in the conflict.
The chaos caused by the war and the draft led many individuals to flee the country. These individuals, known as “Draft Dodgers,” were seen as traitors by those who served in the military and their families, while at the same time being regarded as cult heroes by those who opposed the war.
Like Ford, who thought it best for the country to put Nixon’s Watergate involvement in the rearview mirror, Carter believed the war had taken enough of a toll on the country and issued the pardon to end that chapter of American history.
The pardons in question garnered significant attention due to the individuals involved and the overall implications of the cases. However, when George H.W. Bush pardoned his former defense secretary, Caspar Weinberger, on Christmas Eve in 1992 for his role in the Iran-Contra affair, it barely registered on the national radar in comparison.
Most people, even now, know very little about Iran-Contra, and to be honest, they care even less, so Bush’s preemptive pardon of Weinberger is largely forgotten.
Iran-Contra, the Vietnam War, and Richard Nixon. All national issues with significant importance in one way or another for the healing of the country’s psyche. That was not the case with the preemptive autopen pardons issued hurriedly by the Biden Administration in the final 24 hours between the end of their time in office and the beginning of President Trump’s second term.
Biden issued preemptive pardons protecting family members, including his son, the notorious Hunter Biden, the infamous Dr. Anthony Fauci, administrators, and members of Congress from federal investigations.
Karen Hult, a political expert at Virginia Tech, commented on preemptive pardons.
“In general, preemptive pardons evidently are constitutional, given the broad and quite vague language of Article 2 of the U.S. Constitution. They have also been rare. Their ‘effectiveness,’ of course, depends on the objective being pursued. The pardons likely do not mean that those who received pardons will avoid being publicly or privately criticized or threatened or that they won’t be subject to state-level investigations or possibly civil suits. The pardons do mean that they cannot be charged with federal crimes.”
“President Biden’s issuing of preemptive pardons — for, among others, those involved in prosecuting Trump and participating in congressional hearings on the Jan. 6 insurrection — raises several concerns. First, they focus on possible activities by a newly elected president and his presumptive appointees. If nothing else, such pardons exacerbate relations in an already polarized and distrustful polity. They also continue an escalation of attacks between the two major parties’ elected officials and senior appointees. These pardons in all likelihood will further taint President Biden’s long and generally distinguished public service career and his accomplishments as president.”
Careful analysis of what took place on January 6th has shown that there was more subversive activity by Democrats than the MSM will ever admit to. In addition, the non-stop usage of the totally misleading word “insurrection.”
The Merriam-Webster definition of an insurrection is “a violent, organized uprising by a group of people aimed at resisting, defeating, or overthrowing an established government or civil authority.”
By any stretch of a rational person’s imagination, nothing even remotely close to that, took place on January 6th. This is simply a case of Democrats, the radical left, and the MSM repeating a lie so often that they try to speak it into existence.
The Biden administration also treated those who were arrested horribly. In most cases, these were ordinary Americans who, at times, were placed in solitary confinement and denied rights that hardened criminals routinely receive.
Biden and his cronies knew that an investigation would show how greatly overstated and over-persecuted those in his administration were in pursuing those who were present on January 6th, so to protect them from being exposed, Biden preemptively pardoned them to protect them from their misdeeds.
Trump then responded and either pardoned or commuted the sentences of all involved on January 6th.
Hult was correct in her assessment that Article 2 of the Constitution is vague, and because of that ambiguity, it allows politicians like Biden to protect those who don’t deserve it. The Biden administration weaponized itself against innocent Americans, and despite their unfair persecution, Biden’s autopen preemptively protected them because their guilt was obvious.
Preemptive pardons, although legal, still need to be distributed with solid reasoning and discretion, and that’s something Biden’s auto-pen openly ignored.
