Sports journalist Stephen A. Smith suggested President Joe Biden should consider issuing a pardon to President-elect Donald Trump, arguing this would provide the best path for the country to “move forward.”
Biden issued a sweeping pardon to his son, Hunter Biden, on Sunday night on all “offenses against the United States which he has committed or may have committed or taken part in” over an 11-year period, reversing his previous vow not to issue such a pardon. In reflecting on the pardon with NewsNation anchor Chris Cuomo, Smith was told by Cuomo that he would personally choose to pardon Trump after pardoning Hunter Biden, to which Smith argued, “That’s exactly what I would do.”
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“Enough’s enough,” Smith said. “You know what? You’re the Democrats. You lost the election. You got your butt whipped. You could’ve prevented him from going back to the White House. More than a dozen cases have been dropped against him, the cases that have been ruled against him, he’s going to appeal and he’ll probably get off from having to deal with all of that. It’s time to move forward.”
Smith then argued that Democrats who want to “get at Trump” should gear up for the 2026 midterm elections in two years. He also pointed to how Trump will be president for the next four years, during which Democrats can judge “every single act” he performs as president instead of focusing on the past.
The last president to issue a pardon as sweeping as the one Joe Biden granted to his son was former President Gerald Ford, who pardoned former President Richard Nixon for “all offenses against the United States” he committed or may have committed during his presidency. Smith pointed to this pardon as Ford choosing to move on “for the good of the country.”
“And a lot of times, these folks speak about this stuff, but they don’t do what they say they’re going to do and what they implore others to do, which is where they discuss elevates exponentially for Washington D.C. because we know they’re full of it most of the time, and today was the latest example of that,” Smith said.
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Smith’s suggestion for Biden to pardon Trump comes after outgoing Sen. Joe Manchin (I-VT) made a similar suggestion, as doing so would make the pardon to his son “a lot more balanced.” Manchin has also expressed uncertainty about what the president’s sweeping pardon will mean for his legacy as the 46th president.
The president’s pardon means Hunter Biden may have lost his Fifth Amendment right to remain silent, which could aid Republicans in their investigations on the Biden family’s foreign business dealings. Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) suggested this could be an unintended consequence that the president did not foresee.