The Campaign Moment: Will Biden issue more pardons?
Post Reports
The Washington Post
4.4 • 5.1K Ratings
🗓️ 6 December 2024
⏱️ 30 minutes
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Summary
On Capitol Hill, Hegseth is facing renewed scrutiny over allegations of excessive drinking and sexual misconduct, which he denies. So this week, the veteran and former Fox News host spent time with lawmakers, publicly and privately making the case for his leadership of the Defense Department. But some Republican senators are skeptical, and Trump is reportedly lining up other options.
Senior political reporter Aaron Blake breaks down the latest Cabinet controversies with White House editor Naftali Bendavid and Washington Post Live anchor Leigh Ann Caldwell. Plus, they discuss the extraordinary breadth of Biden’s pardon of his son Hunter and the possibility that Biden will issue more preemptive pardons to critics of the incoming president.
Today’s show was produced by Laura Benshoff. It was edited by Reena Flores and mixed by Justin Gerrish.
Subscribe to Aaron’s newsletter, The Campaign Moment, here.
Subscribe to The Washington Post here.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | So Neftali and Leanne, last weekend we saw President Biden pardoning his son Hunter, |
| 0:09.8 | and it got me thinking, if you had to pardon a member of your family, who would it be and what |
| 0:16.4 | specific crime would it be for? Oh, no, I would get in trouble with a member of my family for saying. |
| 0:24.0 | I think I'd have to issue a blanket pardon. |
| 0:26.2 | I think I'd have to sort of do what President Biden did |
| 0:29.6 | and issue a pardon for all offenses committed in the last 10 years. |
| 0:33.2 | For who, though? |
| 0:33.9 | For everybody? |
| 0:35.1 | Maybe for everybody, yeah. |
| 0:36.7 | You would just... I'd hate everybody, yeah. You would just... |
| 0:37.5 | I'd hate to pick it. |
| 0:38.0 | You would just be completely self-serving with your pardon powers and take it to new heights as far as helping your family out. |
| 0:45.0 | I guess I would do a preemptive pardon for my children for the rest of their lives. |
| 0:51.5 | Leanne stole my answer. No. |
| 1:04.0 | No. Welcome to the campaign moment on this Friday, December 6th. I'm Aaron Blake, senior political reporter and author of the Campaign Moment newsletter. |
| 1:09.0 | From now through inauguration day, I'll be stepping in to host these Friday roundtable discussions, guiding you through the time of the time of the campaign moment newsletter. From now through inauguration day, I'll be stepping in to host |
| 1:11.8 | these Friday roundtable discussions |
| 1:13.6 | guiding you through the top politics |
| 1:15.7 | and presidential transition stories of the week. |
| 1:18.8 | With that bit of housekeeping out of the way, |
| 1:21.3 | today I'm joined by two great guests |
| 1:23.1 | to help me break down this week in politics. |
... |
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