Former NYC GOP Leader Reminds CNN Panelists Calling Trump Corrupt That Biden Pardoned His Entire Family

Joe Borelli, the former Republican leader of the New York City Council, reminded CNN panelists Wednesday that former President Joe Biden pardoned his entire family as they accused President Donald Trump of corruption.

The panelists accused Trump of corruption for inviting the top 220 investors of his meme-coin, $Trump, to dinner, causing it to surge in price, The New York Times reported. Borelli said the Democrats were silent for four years while Biden and his family were so corrupt that the former president had to pardon several members of his family, including his son, Hunter.

“I looked for, in this New York Times article, the allegation of corruption, what was the crime that was being accused,” Borelli said. “Was it inappropriate? Yeah, maybe you could argue that,” Borelli said. “But it’s not illegal and I damn well will play what-about-ism when you had a culture for four years that was so bad, that the president’s final act while he was gumming his eggs and his wife was doing the job was to pardon his entire family. So yes, I will play what-about-ism when the last president was so corrupt that he had to pardon, in advance, his entire family.”

“This is something that only the president can do in virtue to his position. But again, we gotta get off of the what-about-ism,” Democrat Connecticut Rep. Jim Hines responded. “Look, this goes back to Billy Carter, every presidency has had family members try to profit off of the president, but come on, there’s no way you can look at the Trump administration and say ‘he’s not taking everything to 11.’ The Hunter Biden stuff was unseemly, absolutely.”

WATCH:

Biden pardoned his son, Hunter, on Dec. 1 after months of saying he would not do so. He later pardoned his brothers and in-laws just moments before Trump was sworn in on Jan. 20.

Substack author Touré claimed that Biden pardoned his family to protect his family from a so-called “dictator.”

A Delaware jury convicted Hunter in June 2024 on counts that he knowingly possessed a gun while suffering from a drug addiction and made false statements on the purchase document in October 2018. He faced nine separate charges in California on allegations that he failed to pay $1.4 million in taxes between 2016 and 2019.

Despite the fact that Biden’s Department of Justice oversaw the investigations into Hunter, Biden said his family was the victim of “the worst kind of partisan politics.”