Democrats want to revise Constitution, limit presidential pardon power now that Biden got what he wanted

President Joe Biden gave his felonious son, Hunter Biden, a "full and unconditional" pardon Sunday, absolving him — in the eyes of the state — of a decade's worth of crimes that he both committed and may have committed against the United States of America. In doing so, the Democratic president went back on his word, making clear once again it was never reliable to begin with.

Republicans blasted Biden over his hypocrisy as well as the vagueness and breadth of the pardon, which neatly overlapped with the timeline of the Bidens' Burisma scandal — a scandal originally exposed by a report that was strategically censored before the 2020 election and downplayed by a cabal of intelligence officials and the liberal media.

While a handful of Democrats proved willing to criticize Biden, others signaled a desire to exploit the outrage over the pardon in order to prevent a Republican president from following suit.

Democratic Rep. Gerald Connolly, a member of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, told CNN Monday that "we have to revisit the pardon power in the Constitution."

The first clause of Article II Section 2 of the Constitution states, "[The president] shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment."

Connolly said that he could sympathize with Biden's "perspective that his son was, you know, subject to vigilante justice," insinuating that congressional investigators' questions about Hunter Biden's scandalous dealings with the Ukrainian company Burisma and other suspect foreign entities were legally illegitimate.

'I don't believe the pardon power should be as broad as it is.'

"But having said that, what other father in America has the power to pardon his son or daughter if they're convicted of a crime?" said Connolly. "We've got to circumscribe it so that you don't get to pardon relatives, even if you believe passionately they're innocent or that their cause is just."

Connolly refused to condemn either Biden's controversial pardon or former President Bill Clinton's pardon of his drug-trafficking half-brother but proved more than happy to criticize Trump's 2020 pardon of Charles Kushner, Ivanka Trump's father-in-law, calling it an "abuse of power."

After Jim Acosta acknowledged Congress is presently powerless to block pardons, Connolly said, "I think we're probably going to have to amend the Constitution because the pardon power is so sweeping."

Connolly added, "I don't believe the pardon power should be as broad as it is, and we can clearly see how it can be used and abused even with, you know, righteous cause. No other parent in America has the power to pardon their son or daughter for a crime."

'That is the exact opposite of our national principles of the rule of law, equal justice: that no one can be the judge at his or her own trial.'

Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) also suddenly decided to start caring about presidential pardons, tweeting, "Democrats should have been for reforming and curtailing pardon power from Day 1 of the Biden Presidency. As a father, I empathize with President Biden, but we must be the party of reform whether it's about the archaic pardon power, opposing super PACs or broad war powers."

Democrats have a tendency to advocate for limits on the president's power to pardon when a Republican president is in office or, in this case, about to take office.

Democratic Rep. Steve Cohen (Tenn.), for instance, repeatedly advocated for limiting the president's pardon power during Trump's first term, suggesting in a December 2020 op-ed that the Republican president was so anomalous and self-serving a character as to warrant constitutional revisions.

"The broad language used in the Constitution was designed to allow for flexibility, but it also assumes public interest-minded leaders and a respect for institutional norms," wrote Cohen. "With a president unbound by the institutions and norms of our democracy, the ability to pardon himself or herself and his or her family could be abused to create a quasi-hereditary monarchy where the first family is literally beyond the reach of the law. That is the exact opposite of our national principles of the rule of law, equal justice: that no one can be the judge at his or her own trial."

Cohen spared Biden from a similar tongue-lashing on Monday, stating, "President Biden has lost one son and would do anything he could for his remaining son. I'm in no way surprised at this pardon since the father-son bond is so strong. It's also clear that Hunter Biden was targeted because he was the son of the President and held to account in ways similarly situated people would not have been."

"The pardon power is supposed to be a safety valve against injustice, and I understand why President Biden thought it appropriate in this instance," added the Tennessee Democrat, apparently no longer so worried about the creation of a "quasi-hereditary monarchy."

Although sympathetic when a fellow traveler is abusing the power, Cohen signaled a renewed interest in limiting the reform power now that Trump is about to take office, urging his fellow lawmakers to cosponsor and support his constitutional amendment that would "eliminate pardons for the President's self, the President's family, Administration officials and campaign staff, and those who commit crimes on behalf of, for the benefit of, or at the direction of the President."

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