Here’s something both Hunter Biden and Donald Trump should remember: When powerful people face consequences for their actions, they aren’t being treated unfairly. They are being treated like everyone else, something their power and name can’t negate.
Biden, son of President Joe Biden, faces nine new federal indictments on tax charges. These three felony and six misdemeanor charges relate to the younger Biden’s alleged failure to pay roughly $1.4 million in federal taxes over the course of several years. These back taxes have since been paid. These new charges are in addition to the firearms charges that Biden continues to face after a potential plea agreement with prosecutors fell apart earlier this year.
The recent response from Hunter Biden’s lawyer, Abbe Lowell, reads like an entry from the Trump legal playbook for finger pointing.
”Based on the facts and the law, if Hunter’s last name was anything other than Biden, the charges in Delaware, and now California, would not have been brought,” Lowell said in a statement, as reported by the Associated Press.
Lowell has it backward. If Hunter Biden has potentially committed crimes, it doesn’t matter what his name is. If a prosecutor has determined there is enough evidence to charge him, then he should be charged, as he has been. This does not amount to him being targeted because of his last name, or mean that special counsel David Weiss is “bowing to Republican pressure” as Abbe has tried to assert.
If anything, it is Hunter Biden’s last name that has helped shield him from accountability up to this point.
Lowell is attempting to argue that Hunter Biden is somehow the victim of reverse nepotism, where he’s only facing accountability because his father is president. This logically flawed defense isn’t too far off from Trump’s tortured attempts to escape accountability in his many ongoing legal issues. Trump faces unprecedented scrutiny because of his unprecedented actions, not because he’s the victim of a witch hunt, and Hunter Biden is in this position because of his actions and alleged actions, not his name.
Meanwhile, people struggling with grief and substance use deserve compassion and understanding. The important recognitions, however, should not be used by connected and powerful individuals to try to further evade accountability. The facts that Hunter Biden (again, understandably) struggled both with losing his brother Beau and with substance use do not give him a pass on following tax and gun possession laws. Lowell can argue that this history “explains a lot of his misconduct,” but an explanation is not the same thing as an excuse.
Much like Trump and his legal team, the arguments we’re hearing from Hunter Biden’s lawyer lean heavily into excuses, deflection and claims of being treated unfairly.
— Tribune News Service
