WASHINGTON — The Department of Justice on Monday released a final report from the special counsel who charged Hunter Biden with gun and tax crimes before President Joe Biden pardoned his last surviving son.
In the report, Special Counsel David Weiss said that the president could not “rewrite history,” suggesting that Biden’s criticism of the case against his son when announcing his pardon decision had maligned “the public servants at the Department of Justice based solely on false accusations.”
Biden described the prosecution of his son as a “miscarriage of justice” in the official White House statement announcing the pardon, which prosecutors working for Weiss disputed in a later court filing.
“Politicians who attack the decisions of career prosecutors as politically motivated when they disagree with the outcome of a case undermine the public’s confidence in our criminal justice system,” Weiss wrote. “The President’s statements unfairly impugn the integrity not only of Department of Justice personnel, but all of the public servants making these difficult decisions in good faith.”
Biden pardoned his son in early December, not long before the younger Biden was expected to be sentenced in connection with his conviction for violating a statute rarely used by federal prosecutors, which makes it unlawful for drug users to possess weapons. Biden had repeatedly said during the 2024 campaign, including after he dropped out of the race over the summer, that he would not pardon his son.
Weiss, who had bipartisan support when he was named U.S. attorney in Delaware during President Donald Trump’s first term, stayed on at the Justice Department at the beginning of the Biden administration. He was later appointed special counsel by Attorney General Merrick Garland in 2023.
The Justice Department is also expected to issue a report on Jack Smith’s special counsel investigation into Donald Trump’s efforts to stay in power after he lost the 2020 presidential election.
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