CNN’s Kaitlan Collins Asks Why Biden Doesn’t Shield Others On Trump ‘Target List’ Besides Hunter
CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins asked why President Joe Biden didn’t extend the protection of the pardon he granted Hunter Biden to others he believes might be unjustly targeted by President-elect Donald Trump on Monday night.
President Biden stunned the country on Sunday when he announced his pardon of his son, writing that Hunter “was singled out only because he is my son – and that is wrong.”
The pardon was greeted with widespread criticism from the media, including both longtime opponents and even some allies, as well as from President-elect Trump, though some defenses of the decision have been offered by others.
On Monday night’s edition of CNN’s The Source with Kaitlan Collins, Collins noted that one of those possible defenses is that Biden wanted to protect his son from unjust persecution by an administration with a literal enemies list — but asked Van Jones why the president didn’t move to protect more of them:
COLLINS: Well, and Van, I mean, I just am curious for your perspective, because you have long time been a leader for — in criminal justice reform. You’ve led groups, you founded organizations that help people get pardons. So when you view this, and what Biden said in his decision to pardon Hunter Biden, what do you make of it?
VAN JONES: Well, look, I’m not surprised, and I’m willing to give Biden a pass, because his son is going to be sitting in federal prison, while Trump is pardoning — pardoning insurrectionists and all kind of stuff. At some point, this stuff just becomes very human.
My criticism of President Biden is different. He’s used the power of the pardon more sparingly, for people who are not his son than you would expect from a Democratic president. There have been a — there’s been a lot of frustration in the criminal justice community that a lot more people could use that kind of relief.
In this case, look, he’s an elderly guy. He’s got to sense there are a lot of trouble. If he wants to do himself a solid, on the way out the door, I’ll let other people scream about that.
But what about everybody else, who’s sitting there with actual miscarriages of justice, who’ve had no relief in the Biden administration? That’s a bigger problem to me.
COLLINS: Well, yes, Van, I mean, on that point, if you’re — if the point is about concerns that Trump is coming into office, and the people he’s appointing might target Hunter Biden even further than this, even though he was found guilty by a jury of his peers, I should note? Why not pardon Andrew McCabe and Gina Haspel and–
JONES: Sure.
COLLINS: —Mark Esper, and all these people that are on their target list, if you say that that’s why — that that’s the motivation here.
JONES: Yes, I mean — I mean, we’ve gone through this, down this rabbit hole now, where allegations of the justice system being politicized or being thrown around on both sides. I think it’s bad for the country. I do think there should be a real process to pardon people. I think the Biden administration has been relaxed on that.
But if you’re going to do it, don’t just do it for your son. There are a lot of people that the Trump administration might go after. Protect them. And there are a lot of just everyday people, who have sitting there, been begging for relief for years and years. If you’re going to do it, don’t just do it for your son. There are a lot of American sons and daughters who could use the same kind of relief.
Watch above via CNN’s The Source with Kaitlan Collins.
