I don't know if I've mentioned it here before, but thirty years ago, Hunter Biden was one of my best friends in the world. He and Kathleen and their toddler daughter, Naomi, lived across the street from me and my fiancee in New Haven after Hunter transferred to Yale Law School. We hung out in their bottom two floors townhouse apartment probably three or four evenings a week. Hunter was one of my groomsmen when I got married in 1996; Kathleen was matron of honor. Hunter was a good, sweet-hearted guy who would give you the shirt off his back if you asked.
I think the last time I saw him was probably at his house in Delaware in the spring of 2000. The last time I spoke to him was probably around 2009. We fell out of touch.
Obviously, his life went off the rails for whatever combination of reasons, most obviously drugs. This has all been sad to watch. From a personal standpoint, seeing him become a convicted felon today is not a happy event. But as he must have known at some level, he had it coming. And today it came.
As an American, I'm glad, just as I'm glad Trump was convicted a couple weeks ago. They both had it coming, and in both instances it came — despite who they were. Some might argue that each of them was only prosecuted because of who he is. But as pundits have been speculating about possible criminal sentences, it should have become clear to everyone that these are categories of crimes that people are prosecuted and convicted for all the time. It is this fact that provides the basis for the speculation about sentences.
You can disagree with the outcome of a trial, but these particular trials and their particular outcomes tell me that at least in this particular way our legal system is strong. Hunter Biden was convicted by a jury of his peers in his small home state, a state which his family has left its mark on probably more than the Kennedy's have left their mark on Massachusetts. Similarly, Trump was convicted by a jury of fellow New Yorkers. The process of jury selection weeds out the obviously problematic jurors, and then the facts are presented and the people decide. In the midst of a presidential campaign, both the son of the sitting president and the former and perhaps future president were each tried and convicted in American courts of law. From a political perspective, that's a mournful statement about America's politics. However, from the perspective of the constitution and the basic integrity of our legal system, it's reason to celebrate — just as it was reason to celebrate that Trump left office in January of 2021 despite the severe stress he put on our constitutional system. Trump’s presidency applied a real world, real time stress test. The system held; he left; and I remain confident the system will continue to hold whatever future stressors may come.
Today's verdict, like the one a couple weeks ago, should give us confidence in this regard.
“From a political perspective, that's a mournful statement about America's politics.”
Exactly. It all is a mournful statement about America’s politics.