President Joe Biden’s pardon of his son Hunter is a done deal. The president not only averted the ongoing cases against Hunter; The broad pardon effectively shields his son from prosecution for any federal crimes he may have committed over the course of more than a decade. This pardon is a terrible idea – “both dishonorable and unwise,” in the words of the Bulwark Editor Jonathan Last — and as my colleague Jonathan Chait wrote yesterday, it reflected Biden’s decision to “put his own feelings above defending his country.”

But it was also a huge strategic mistake that will haunt Democrats heading into the first years of another Trump administration.

The Constitution gives American presidents the power to pardon anyone for crimes against the United States. (You cannot pardon people for state-level crimes.) Typically, such pardons include clemency for common criminals; Occasionally they involve unpleasant personal or political favors to friends, allies, and, more rarely, family. However, Donald Trump has promised to begin the process of highly controversial pardons as soon as he takes office.

Perhaps most disturbing, he said he would begin reviewing the cases of the Jan. 6 insurgents — whom he called “warriors” and “hostages” — and release many of them from prison. Nothing will stop Trump from doing such things, nor will he pay a political price for such future pardons: all he ever cared about was winning the White House to stay out of prison, and he’s on that mission fulfilled.

But the Republican Party is now a wholly owned subsidiary of Trump World, and if Biden had not pardoned his son, elected Republicans at every level would have had to answer for Trump’s actions, without reference to the Bidens. They should have said on the record whether they agreed with Trump letting people who stormed the Capitol and attacked police officers out of prison. Although Trump would have remained out of voters’ reach, vulnerable Republicans running for re-election might have asked him to avoid some of the potentially more heinous pardons.

Forget all that. Joe Biden has now provided every Republican — and especially those running for Congress in 2026 — with a ready-made heat shield against any criticism of Trump’s pardons, past or present. Biden has effectively neutralized pardons as a political issue, and worse, he has inadvertently given strength to Trump’s narrative about the unreliability of American institutions. Biden first promised to respect the jury’s verdict in Hunter’s gun trial and vowed not to pardon Hunter – then said he had to act because “crude politics” had “infected this trial.” And so every Republican can now say: When it comes to pardons, all I know is that I agree with Joe Biden that the Justice Department cannot be trusted to treat Americans fairly. I’m glad he finally saw the light.

Some people view Joe’s pardon of Hunter as an act of mercy, an expression of a father’s love for his son who has endured the hell of addiction. I understand these arguments. (In 2020, I wrote about Joe and Hunter’s relationship.) I also know that many Americans believe Hunter would be targeted by the Justice Department next year as part of Trump’s revenge carnival. I’m less convinced of that, not least because Joe Biden could have waited until Hunter was convicted of his federal crimes later this month and then commuted his sentences while crafting a more limited pardon for other issues. Instead, the father released the son of all federal crimes he had committed over more than a decade of his life.

And I fully understand that requests for norms have little impact on Democrats, who are tired of clinging to such outlandish ideas while Trump destroys them at will. It’s stomach-churning to see Republicans criticizing Biden for this pardon after Trump handed them out during his first term like a guy handing out drink vouchers outside a casino. And also, some might say Who cares about norms and the rule of law when Trump is back in power? The Bidens should get what they can get while giving Trump the finger, right?

I think anyone who makes these nihilistic arguments will regret them, but that’s a discussion for another day. In the meantime, I’m more concerned about Hunter’s pardon than a practical political matter.

Biden has now destroyed a powerful argument that his own party could have made even against Trump by 2026. Most people understand corruption, and while they may not be particularly interested in it, they don’t like it being thrown in their face. Some of Trump’s pardons may have been politically damaging for Republicans: Just over a week ago, a poll found that 64 percent of Americans would object to pardoning those convicted of Jan. 6-related crimes.

But how do Democrats argue now that Biden sounds so much like Trump on the justice system? Biden’s statement about the pardon had a kind of Trumpian, non-specific paranoia: “In trying to break Hunter,” the president explained, “they tried to break me – and there’s no reason to think it will stop there.” “Enough is enough.”

As Chait asks, “Are you trying to break Hunter?” And his father? For what purpose?” This pardon has more than a hint of panic in it, and with President Biden unsettled about the outcome of a controlled trial by his own Justice DepartmentHow can any of us object to the fact that a future President Trump would release people from prison for the same fears? The reality, of course, is that Trump’s malicious and troll pardoning of various weirdos and cronies is nothing like a tormented father pardoning his son, but President Biden has now made sure that no one really cares about the difference.

Joe Biden is at the end of his career and angry at a political world that has made his son an object of hatred and ridicule. With the stroke of a pen, he saved Hunter and showed it to everyone else – perhaps including the people who forced him to abandon his campaign while Hunter was supposedly begging him to stay the course. Any parent can understand why they wanted to scream Fuck you into the wind before walking out the door. Unfortunately, in doing so, he may have also screwed over many members of his own party – and undermined the resolve they need to defend the rule of law.

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1. Trump announced Saturday that he had named Kash Patel, a former public defender and Trump loyalist, as FBI director. The nomination would require the removal of Trump-appointed FBI Director Christopher Wray.
2. Rebels against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad advanced over the weekend and captured Aleppo, the country’s second largest city.
3. French lawmakers filed motions of no confidence in Prime Minister Michel Barnier; If successful, the vote could split his government.

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Evening reading

America stopped cooking with suet for a reason

By Yasmin Tayag

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s latest take on MAGA, “Make Friting Oil Tallow Again,” is surprisingly straightforward for a man who has spent decades downplaying his most controversial opinions. Last month, Kennedy argued in an Instagram post that Americans would be healthier if restaurants like McDonald’s cooked fries in suet – or cow fat – instead of seed oils, a collective term for common vegetable oils such as corn, canola, etc. He wrote that Americans were being “unknowingly poisoned by seed oils”; In his opinion, we would all be better off cooking with solid fats like tallow, butter and lard. In a video Kennedy posted on Thanksgiving, he deep-fries a whole turkey in suet and says, “This is how we cook the MAHA way.”

Cardiologists shuddered at the thought.

Read the full article.

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Take a photo. Would you pay $1,000 for a family photo? Some parents spend money trying to capture the perfect picture, writes Erin Sagen.

Play. Wyna Liu, the editor of the New York Times Game Connections, discusses her process and the particular anger her puzzles inspire.

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