'Laughable': Dem strategist confronts CNN Republican over 'bringing truth' to White House

A pair of CNN commentators clashed over president Joe Biden's sweeping pardon of his son.

The president pardoned his younger son Hunter Biden, who was convicted in June of illegally buying and possessing a gun as a drug user and pleaded guilty in September to nine charges in a federal tax case, and former Republican House candidate Tiffany Smiley argued that was the sort of corruption voters turned against in November.

"You know, look, let's be honest, president Trump made comments that he would be willing to pardon, that he would consider pardoning, you know, pardoning Hunter Biden and, you know, as a mom of three boys, like, everyone can sympathize and understand what president Biden is doing with his son," said Smiley, who lost a Washington GOP primary in August. "But I think it's important to also know that president Biden's Department of Justice, you know, tried a back-door deal to help Hunter Biden, right, while simultaneously going after concerned parents on school boards, going after Catholics and pro-life activists, so, you know, at the end of the day, the Democrats have a hole to dig out of, and this just made it worse because president Biden lied repeatedly."

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Attorney general Merrick Garland directed federal law enforcement to cooperate with local police on harassment of school officials during the Covid pandemic, and a leaked FBI memo warned that violent extremists may gravitate toward “radical-traditionalist Catholic ideology."

"The D.C. Democrats need to wake up and realize that the rest of America is in a completely different place on this," Smiley said, "and not only that, president Trump is going to be bringing, he wants to bring respect back, truth back into these departments, and what is going on with president Biden and Hunter is a clear case why the American people have lost faith."

Democratic strategist Maria Cardona argued that anyone who is a parent could sympathize with Biden's decision to grant clemency to his son, who had faced a maximum but highly unlikely 42 years in prison for all of his convictions, but she said Trump's allies had been targeting Hunter Biden for years.

"I think his mistake was having been so definitive before, prior to all of this, that he would not do it now, I don't think he lied," Cardona said. "I think circumstances changed, and I think had the election gone the other way, we may not be in this situation, but when you take a look at the people who Donald Trump is nominating and, I'm sorry, but I find it laughable when you say that Donald Trump wants to bring truth back into the government – that's a guffaw right there – but when you see the people that he is nominating, they literally along with Donald Trump, like you just mentioned, have a list of people that they are focused on revenge against, on retribution."

"The fact that Hunter Biden has been this one thing that Republicans have been obsessed with as the way to get to president Biden, and president Biden sees that and he's like, 'You know what?'" she added. "'I have this power. I have this one chance to shield my one and only surviving son and my family from the kind of torture these people want and are salivating to go against my son and my family – I'm going to do it.'"

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