Clinton says Hunter Biden pardon is not the same as his half-brother's

Former President Bill Clinton suggested Wednesday that his decision to pardon his half-brother Roger Clinton was not comparable to President Biden's pardon of his son, Hunter Biden.

The New York Times reported that while Clinton was not "directly criticizing" Biden's decision while speaking at the DealBook Summit, he did say that Roger Clinton had served time and unable to vote because of his status as a felon.

In 2001, then-President Clinton pardoned Roger Clinton, who was sentenced to more than a year in prison after pleading guilty to selling cocaine to an undercover police officer. 

Clinton's comments come following President Biden's announcement that he is pardoning Hunter Biden ahead of sentencing hearings in both his tax and gun cases in the coming weeks, despite long maintaining he would not do so.

The decision threatens to tarnish the president's legacy as he faces backlash from both Democrats and Republicans.

Biden said in a statement issued Sunday that his son had been targeted for political reasons.

“No reasonable person who looks at the facts of Hunter’s cases can reach any other conclusion than Hunter was singled out only because he is my son — and that is wrong,” President Biden said in a statement, adding that “enough is enough.”

“Here’s the truth: 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.”