Former President Biden's communications director Kate Bedingfield on Tuesday slammed her former boss over the controversial pardon he granted the president just before leaving office.
CNN's political commentators decried President Biden's pardon on Inauguration Day, saying it goes against his rhetoric about respecting the “rule of law.”
“It was an unfortunate move. I was disappointed. I think it spoke eloquently about the need to uphold the rule of law,” he said.
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Former Biden official Kate Bedingfield on Tuesday criticized President Biden for granting last-minute pardons to families.
Biden pardoned family members James Biden, Sarah Jones Biden, Valerie Biden Owens, John Owens and Frances Biden on Monday, minutes before Trump was inaugurated.
In a statement accompanying the pardon, Biden said the pardon was intended to protect it from “politically motivated investigations.”
Earlier Monday, before leaving office, Biden also pardoned Dr. Anthony Fauci, General Mark Milley and others involved in the Jan. 6 House Select Committee investigation.
The Inauguration Day pardons follow high-profile pardons that Biden enacted late last year, specifically for his son Hunter Biden, who was convicted on federal charges related to illegal possession of firearms and tax evasion. It is something.
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Biden on Monday granted preemptive pardons to several prominent critics of Donald Trump. (L-R: (Photo credit: William B. Plowman/NBC via Getty Images), (Photo credit: Mandel Ngan – Pool/Getty Images), (Photo credit: Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images), (Photo credit: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images) ))
Bedingfield suggested Biden's last-minute pardons were hypocritical, watching the former president once denounce the idea of Trump pardoning families at the end of the first administration reminded the person.
“When President Trump took office in 2020, he talked about the idea of pardoning families and said it would send a bad message,” the former Biden official said, adding that Trump's criticism of pardons also extended to Biden himself. He added that it would extend.
“I think it's hard to argue that yesterday wasn't the case. I'll be completely honest: I think it was disappointing,” she said.
But Bedingfield gave Biden some protection, noting that Biden's change in stance on pardons could reflect Trump's willingness to go after political opponents.
“I think we also need to recognize that we are now entering the era of Trump 2.0, where Trump has made it very clear that he intends to use the long arm of government to hunt down his political opponents. I understand that Joe Biden looks like that, saying to his family, 'I'm going to do everything I can to protect them when I walk out the door,''' she said.
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“As a human issue, I understand that argument,” she added.
Bedingfield also said he doesn't think Biden's pardon will cover up his actions while Trump was in office.
On Monday, in one of his first acts since taking office, President Trump signed an executive order pardoning more than 1,500 people charged with crimes stemming from the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. The order requires the Federal Bureau of Prisons to act immediately upon receiving a pardon.
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