On Sunday, House Oversight Chairman James Comer (R-KY) expressed skepticism about the preemptive pardons then-President Joe Biden granted to his family members in the final days of his administration, stating that he didn’t believe they would “hold up in court.” Just minutes before
Donald Trump was sworn in for a second term last week, Biden announced pardons for several family members, including his brother James B. Biden, his sister Valerie Biden Owens, Valerie Owens’ husband John T. Owens, and his brother Francis W. Biden, citing the possibility of “politically motivated investigations.”
Biden had previously pardoned his son, Hunter, who had been convicted of tax evasion and gun crimes. Comer, who led an impeachment investigation into Biden focused on corruption and authored a book about his inquiry, described the preemptive pardons as
an “admission of guilt.” He also suggested during an appearance on Sunday Morning Futures with Fox News anchor Maria Bartiromo that scrutiny of the Biden administration could continue, when asked if viewers should expect that the Bidens “got away with it.”
Comer replied, “I certainly hope not,” before referring to Pam Bondi, Trump’s nominee to become U.S. Attorney General; Kash Patel, Trump’s pick to become
FBI director; and new CIA Director John Ratcliffe. ““The ball is going to be in Pam Bondi’s court. We’re communicating with her people right now. I have had a good meeting with Kash Patel. One thing I’m confident is going to happen — and you saw that with John Ratcliffe — we’re going to hold people in the government accountable that were involved in the cover-up.”
“He’s already held the 51 intelligence officials that lied to the American people when they said the Hunter Biden laptop was Russian disinformation, when most of them in fact knew that it was not Russian disinformation,” Comer added.
Now we want to get the people that were involved in the cover-ups, because what we found in our investigation — and I write about it extensively in my book — is that there were four different agencies investigating the Bidens, the IRS, the Department of Justice, the FBI, and the Securities and Exchange Commission.”
Comer went on to say, “And, obviously, they wanted to get to Joe Biden, because none of this money would be coming into the president’s son or brother were it not for Joe Biden. Every time they got ready to ask Joe Biden, they were told to stand down by a deep state actor.
I want those people held accountable. And then, with respect to the Bidens, I don’t think these preemptive pardons would hold up in court. I would like to see a jury that would be sympathetic to what he said,
We’re pardoning you for anything you may have done over the past decade pertaining to influence peddling.’ That’s baloney, and no jury in America would buy that, in my opinion.”
As she wrapped up the interview, Bartiromo asked the Kentucky Republican if he believed the pre-emptive pardons were legitimate: “I don’t. But there are a lot better legal minds than mine, I’m sure. But the — I don’t think the average person that works hard and pays taxes has much sympathy for a president that, in his last act in office, pardoned his entire family for financial public corruption and didn’t have the guts to tell anybody why he did it.”
