President Trump repeatedly suggested that it was a mistake for former President Biden not to preemptively pardon himself before leaving office during a Wednesday interview.
In a sit-down with Fox News host Sean Hannity, Trump also sidestepped questions about whether Biden should face an investigation. However, Trump made it clear on several occasions that Biden should have used his pardon power to protect himself.
“This guy went around giving everybody pardons,” he said. “And you know, the funny thing, maybe the sad thing, is he didn’t give himself a pardon. And if you look at it, it all had to do with him.”
Trump added that Biden “got very bad advice.”
“Joe Biden has very bad advisers. Somebody advised Joe Biden to give pardons to everybody but him,” Trump said.
AdvertisementTrump also told Hannity that he would defer to Congress on whether lawmakers should investigate Biden and his decision to pardon family members and Trump critics, including retired Gen. Mark Milley, former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), and members of the House panel that investigated the January 6 Capitol attack.
In announcing the pardons, Biden hypocritically expressed concern that the individuals could face politically motivated investigations by the Justice Department under Trump.
The current commander-in-chief also appeared to suggest that Biden and other critics should undergo the same legal challenges that he experienced over the past two years following his indictments in New York, Georgia, Florida, and Washington, D.C.
“I went through four years of hell by this scum that we had to deal with. I went through four years of hell,” Trump said of his legal battles. “I spent millions of dollars in legal fees, and I won. But I did it the hard way. It’s really hard to say that they shouldn’t have to go through it also. It is very hard to say it.”
Trump told Hannity that his advisers told him he should consider pardoning himself as he prepared to leave the White House following his first term.
“I was given the option. They said sir, would you like to pardon everybody, including yourself?’ I said, ‘I’m not going to pardon anybody. We didn’t do anything wrong,’” Trump said.
While a self-pardon would have shielded Trump from being targeted by federal prosecutors, it would not have protected him from state and local charges like those he faced in New York and Georgia, legal experts say. But that said, his felony convictions in New York are going to be appealed, he has previously said, while the case in Fulton County, Ga., involving allegations of racketeering involving the 2020 election has all but fallen apart due to District Attorney Fani Willis’ legally and ethically questionable behavior and actions throughout the case.
Meanwhile, Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-Ga.) revealed earlier this week that House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) promised him that his investigation into the actions of the Nancy Pelosi-picked January 6 Committee could continue and would be formalized into an official subcommittee.
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Loudermilk told CNN that details are still being worked out, but he told the outlet that the focus would shift from trying to blame the entire ordeal on Trump to whether the Dem-led J6 Committee’s investigation was legitimate or politically motivated.
“It was so singularly focused that basically, Trump created this entire problem,” Loudermilk said of the former committee that now-Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) and former Wyoming Republican Rep. Liz Cheney helped lead. “When in reality, it was a multitude of failures at different levels.”
CNN reported: “Continuing its investigation into the previous January 6 select committee – which featured Cheney as a vice chair and had another Republican member – and broader security response to the Capitol attack is not the only way Republicans plan to use their new majority to carry over their previous investigations that remain politically charged.
