Hunter Biden isn't the only member of his family with a presidential pardon. In his last minutes in office, Joe Biden pardoned his three younger siblings and two of their spouses. He issued blanket pardons for his brother James and James' wife, Sara; his sister Valerie and her husband, John Owens; and his brother Francis, the AP reports. None of them had been charged with any crimes. "My family has been subjected to unrelenting attacks and threats, motivated solely by a desire to hurt me—the worst kind of partisan politics," Biden said. "Unfortunately, I have no reason to believe these attacks will end." It was his last statement as president, the New York Times reports.
"The issuance of these pardons should not be mistaken as an acknowledgment that they engaged in any wrongdoing, nor should acceptance be misconstrued as an admission of guilt for any offense," Biden said. The White House announced the pardons with less than 20 minutes remaining in Biden's presidency, when he had already entered the Capitol Rotunda for the swearing-in of President Trump, the Times reports.
In another last-minute action, Biden commuted the life sentence of Indigenous activist Leonard Peltier, convicted in the 1975 murders of two FBI agents, to home confinement, the Wall Street Journal reports. Biden also pardoned two Democratic politicians: Former Kentucky state Rep. Gerald Lundergan and former Columbia, South Carolina city council member Ernest William Cromartie. Lundergan was convicted of making illegal contributions to his daughter's unsuccessful US Senate campaign and Cromartie was convicted of tax evasion, the AP reports. Earlier Monday. Biden pardoned Anthony Fauci, among others. (More President Biden stories.)