As a rule, it’s generally best not to focus too much attention on the family members of politicians. If elected officials’ kids enter the political arena — serving in positions of public power or influence, for example — the standards change, but in general, the fact that someone is related to a politician does not mean he or she necessarily deserves extra scrutiny.
With Hunter Biden, this rule has largely been thrown out the window. President Joe Biden’s son has never worked in the White House, does not appear to have any influence in any area of public policy, and has never sought public office. He’s nevertheless been the subject of intense Republican interest for several years.
It’s against this backdrop that NBC News reported this morning:
The Trump-appointed U.S. Attorney for Delaware has reached a plea agreement with Hunter Biden, in which he is expected to plead guilty to two federal misdemeanor counts of failing to pay his taxes. Biden also faces a separate felony gun possession charge that will likely be dismissed if he meets certain conditions, according to court documents filed on Tuesday. Two sources familiar with the agreement told NBC News that it includes a provision in which the U.S. attorney has agreed to recommend probation for Biden for his tax violations.
As my MSNBC colleague Jordan Rubin noted in a related piece, this means Biden, as part of his plea agreement, is unlikely to receive a jail sentence.
Whether one sees this news as worthy of national attention or not, it’s certainly historic: This is the first time in American history that the child of a sitting president has been prosecuted by the Justice Department.
In fact, in the abstract, the circumstances are remarkable — and to a degree, encouraging. In the United States, we take the rule of law so seriously that Justice Department officials felt comfortable prosecuting a sitting president’s kid without fear of retribution and without interference from the White House.
Indeed, let’s also not lose sight of the fact that the prosecutor in this case was appointed, not by the Democratic incumbent, but by Donald Trump. Joe Biden kept David Weiss, the U.S. Attorney in Delaware, in his position so that he could continue the investigation into his son.
It’s a reminder as to how the system should work.
That said, Republicans apparently don’t quite see it this way. Trump said last fall that the federal prosecutor in this case “has been told to do NOTHING” — there was no such directive; the former president just made this up — and this morning the Republican pointed to Hunter Biden’s prosecution as proof of “corruption” in federal law enforcement, reality notwithstanding. Despite the fact that the case was overseen by a Trump-appointed prosecutor, congressional Republicans are throwing related fits, claiming the modest sentence in this case is proof of … something nefarious. It is not. What it’s actually proof of is something altogether more important: Hunter Biden cooperated with federal investigators and listened to his defense attorneys. Donald Trump, on the other hand, refused to cooperate with federal investigators and thought it’d be a good idea to ignore his defense attorney — specifically the one who said the former president would likely avoid an indictment if only they returned the classified documents and negotiated a settlement. That lawyer was almost certainly correct. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy claimed this morning that the Hunter Biden case is evidence of a “two-tier system.” That’s true, but not in the way the GOP leader meant: There’s apparently one tier for criminal suspects who cooperate with prosecutors and listen to sensible defense attorneys, and another for criminal suspects who don’t.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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