Rachel Maddow defends Biden’s pardon for Hunter because Kash Patel has a ‘hit list’

MSNBC star Rachel Maddow rationalized on Monday night President Joe Biden’s pardon of his son Hunter by framing it within the context of President-elect Donald Trump’s nomination of far-right extremist Kash Patel to lead the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Specifically, the progressive host noted that the possible FBI director has “literally published a hit list of people he wants to go after once” the incoming president takes power, referencing Patel’s 2023 book Government Gangsters: The Deep State, the Truth, and the Battle for Our Democracy.

The president, who said “no one is above the law” after Trump’s 34 felony convictions, has received intense blowback over his decision to issue a sweeping pardon that encompasses not only his son’s federal gun and tax evasion charges but also any potential criminal activities related to Hunter’s business dealings over the past decade.

Republicans, and some Democrats, have blasted Biden for going back on his promise to not give his son clemency, accusing him of rank hypocrisy. Of course, Trump and his “first buddy” Elon Musk have sounded off on the pardon, describing it as a “miscarriage of justice” while wondering if Biden will now release the “hostages” who’ve been charged with storming the Capitol on January 6.

At the same time, while conservatives continue to rail against Biden, many liberals have called out the Republican “pearl-clutching” over the decision, claiming outgoing “presidents do this every time.”

During the top of her primetime show Monday evening, Maddow unleashed a stemwinder of a monologue where she invoked the 1954 suicide of Sen. Lester Hunt — which came after GOP senators targeted his son at the height of McCarthyism — before bringing up Biden’s rationale in pardoning Hunter.

“And they decided that that father’s love for his son would be their best and most effective weapon against the father. Get him right in the heart,” she said. “One of the most despicable episodes I know of in the entire modern history of American politics, just a Shakespearean crash of evil against love, with the result being a good man shooting himself at his desk in the United States Senate. That was 70 years ago, 1954.”

After reading Biden’s statement on the pardon, which featured the president claiming “they have tried to break me” in their “effort to break Hunter,” Maddow suggested the president was justified in reneging on his pledge not to wipe away his son’s criminal charges. And it was largely because of Trump’s pick of Patel.

“It is true that President Biden had said he wouldn’t pardon his son,” she declared. “And it may or may not be related, but would it change your mind at all if after you made a pledge like that, the incoming next president then announced that he planned to remove the director of the FBI and install in his place someone who has literally published a hit list of people he wants to go after once Trump is back in power? There are 60 names on this list.”

In the appendix of his book, Patel — who has said a new Trump administration should root out all federal employees who are not sufficiently MAGA — lists dozens of current and former “Deep State” government officials who he feels should be targeted for prosecution. Among the names are former FBI Director James Comey, current FBI chief Christopher Wray, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Vice President Kamala Harris, among others.

“So, what would you do? What would you do if after you made that pledge to not pardon your son, that’s what the next president said he was going to do to U.S. law enforcement? What would you do?” Maddow continued. “What is reasonable to demand of a man after what’s been done to your son already, right? You ready to put him back in the barrel?”

Maddow then sarcastically said that perhaps Biden should have also named Hunter the ambassador to France, referencing Trump’s recent nomination of Charles Kushner to that post. Kushner, the father of Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, was pardoned by Trump in December 2020 after pleading guilty to witness tampering and tax evasion over a revenge and intimidation scheme he launched against his brother-in-law.

“And so, yeah, cue all the handwringing and gnashing of teeth today about a president using his power — his pardon power, his powers as president, to do something for a family member,” she added. “I mean, Trump pardoned a family member and then named him ambassador to France. I mean, he has no qualifications whatsoever to be America’s ambassador to France.”