ESPN commentator Stephen A. Smith denounced President Joe Biden’s decision to pardon his son, Hunter, on the eve of his leaving the White House.
In a statement on Sunday, President Biden announced that he would be pardoning his son, Hunter Biden, saying that his son was “unfairly prosecuted” for federal gun charges and tax evasion charges. Hunter was set to be sentenced on December 12 for the first crime and on December 16 for the second crime.
“I believe in the justice system, but as I have wrestled with this, I also believe raw politics has infected this process, and it led to a miscarriage of justice — and once I made this decision this weekend, there was no sense in delaying it further. I hope Americans will understand why a father and a President would come to this decision,” Biden said.
Speaking on his show Monday night, Stephen A. Smith said the president is “full of it.”
“Respectfully, to the president of the United States, specifically as it pertains to that statement, you’re full of it,” he said. “I’m going to look right here, over the national airwaves, and look the president of the United States in the face and say, ‘You’re full of it.’”
While Smith understood why Biden would issue the pardon as a father, theorizing that Trump would have done the same, he took issue with Biden’s long-winded excuse instead of just standing behind his son.
“I said weeks ago, you’re damn right you should let him off. He’s your son, and he’s a recovering addict, and he’s battled those demons for years,” Smith said. “And the fact that you let your son off, I totally understand. Donald Trump would have let his son off. Anybody would have, or at least most people. I understand that. That’s not the issue, sir.
“The issue, and why I say you’re full of it, is because of the excuse you gave. A simple statement, ‘That’s my son. I have the power to pardon him, to grant him clemency, whatever. That’s what I’m doing. You all kick rocks.’ That would have been good enough for me. That’s your son. That’s your son, that’s your flesh and blood. That’s your child. And as you pointed out, he’s battled a lot of demons. He’s going through a lot. I get it. But what’s all of that other stuff you said about him?”
Smith further ripped into Biden for waiting until after the election to issue his pardon after pushing legal efforts against Trump for so many months.
“You didn’t talk about this then. As a matter of fact, you specifically said you wouldn’t pardon your son … before the election. You’re announcing it now that we know Donald Trump is coming in and about to be sworn in as the 47th president. You were intending to do this all along, which again is no problem. But it doesn’t make you any less full of it,” he said.
“Because when you look at Donald Trump and how the Democrats went after him … you do understand the Democrats are no longer in a position to say anything, right? You can talk till the cows come home. You whistling into the wind. Nobody wants to hear what you have to say right now. I’m not talking about you; I’m talking about your party,” he continued.
Smith concluded that Biden harmed the American people by going back on his original word not to pardon his son.
“Because when you pardon your son, going back on your word, telling the American people there was no way you were going to pardon him when everybody and your grandmama knew you were lying and didn’t hold you accountable for it,” he said. “And now you’ve confirmed what people believed you were probably going to be lying about, that very thing that you said you wouldn’t do for your son. All you had to do was say, ‘He’s my son. I can’t let him go to jail.’ What’s the matter with y’all?”
Paul Roland Bois directed the award-winning Christian tech thriller, EXEMPLUM, which has a 100% Rotten Tomatoes critic rating and can be viewed for FREE on YouTube, Tubi, or Fawesome TV. “Better than Killers of the Flower Moon,” wrote Mark Judge. “You haven’t seen a story like this before,” wrote Christian Toto. A high-quality, ad-free rental can also be streamed on Google Play, Vimeo on Demand, or YouTube Movies. Follow him on X @prolandfilms or Instagram @prolandfilms.