Biden sets clemency record

The US president has commuted the sentences of almost 1,500 people, less than two weeks after pardoning his son Hunter.

Outgoing US President Joe Biden has commuted the sentences of 1,499 people and pardoned 39 non-violent offenders, the White House announced on Thursday.

Earlier this month, he also granted a blanket pardon to his son Hunter, claiming he had been convicted for political reasons.

The decision is the largest single-day clemency in US history, according to the statement. The previous record was set by President Barack Obama, who commuted 330 sentences shortly before leaving office in 2017. Biden’s predecessor and successor, Donald Trump, issued 237 executive grants of clemency during his first term, of which nearly 150 were granted in the final days of his presidency, in early 2021.

Biden has commuted the sentences of people “who have successfully reintegrated into their families and communities,” the announcement said. Many of those on the list were released from prisons to home confinement during the Covid-19 pandemic, when the infection swept through US detention facilities, affecting as many as 20% of the prison population.

The pardons were largely given to “individuals convicted of simple use and possession of marijuana” and to “former LGBTQI+ service members convicted of private conduct because of their sexual orientation,” the statement said. Biden’s use of presidential power builds on his “record of criminal justice reform to help reunite families, strengthen communities, and reintegrate individuals back into society,” it added.

As a member of Congress, Biden was instrumental in passing the 1994 Crime Bill, a controversial piece of legislation that critics say resulted in mass incarceration of nonviolent offenders, who were disproportionately black people convicted on drug charges. Passed under President Bill Clinton, the law “shaped Democratic Party politics for years to come,” triggering “a bidding war to increase penalties for crime” with the Republican Party, according to the American Civil Liberties Union, a leading human rights group.

On December 1, Biden announced that he was pardoning his son, Hunter, who was would have faced sentencing this month for federal tax and gun convictions. The president claimed that the prosecution was flawed and politically motivated. The move came despite multiple assurances by Biden and his office that he would not shield his son from criminal liability.

Only 20% of Americans and 40% Democrats approved of the pardoning of Hunter Biden, according to an opinion poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.