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November 21, 2022
Does Prez Biden's clemency record in 2022 deserve some praise on the day of turkey pardons?
Prez Biden today engaged in the annual turkey pardon silliness at the White House, and I found this array of headlines about the event amusing:
From AP, "Biden opens holidays, pardons turkeys Chocolate and Chip"
From CNN, "Biden pardons Thanksgiving turkeys: 'No ballot stuffing, no fowl play'"
From Fox News, "80-year-old Biden falsely claims Delaware has most chickens in the nation"
Media biases aside, I usually have my own bias toward criticizing each and every president on this day for pardoning turkeys so regularly while granting clemencies to people so rarely. Here are a few prior posts of this vintage:
- Clemency criticisms as Prez Biden's record is now turkeys 2, humans 0
- Hasn't Prez Trump has already pardoned a turkey before this week's traditional ceremony?
- Pardon people, not turkeys: Under President Obama, the odds of clemency or commutation are shamefully slim
- Justified complaints that Obama's first pardon will be of a turkey
- Shouldn't the turkeys have been named Scooter and Libby?
But, as the title of this post asks, I am wondering whether I have to use this day in 2022 to praise rather than criticize President Joe Biden's clemency record. Back in April, as detailed here, Prez Biden used his clemency pen to grant three pardons and 75 commutations. And last month, as detailed here, Prez Biden pardoned many thousands of persons federally convicted of simple possession of marijuana. This record puts Prez Biden way ahead of any other modern President in terms of clemency grants in his first few years in office, and I do think that merits some praise.
That said, as perhaps the title of this post hints, I also think there is far more that a president can and should do with the clemency pen, and so I am eager to push Prez Biden to do more, a lot more. There are still many thousands of persons serving excessive federal prison terms and hundreds of thousands pf persons burdened with the collateral consequences of low-level federal convictions. Though I am prepared to praise Prez Biden for what he has done so far, I also want to make sure he knows there is a lot more clemency work to do.
November 21, 2022 at 05:01 PM | Permalink
Comments
Don't know about Biden, but Oregon's governor Kate Brown announced she is pardoning 45,000 folks who were convicted of simple possession of marijuana before 1916 (when Oregon decriminalized simple possession).
Posted by: Michael R. Levine | Nov 21, 2022 7:35:25 PM