WASHINGTON — With hours left in his presidency, President Joe Biden announced Monday he has pardoned Dr. Anthony Fauci, retired Gen. Mark Milley and all the members of the House committee, and the US Capitol and DC Metropolitan police who testified before the committee.
The decision by Biden comes after Donald Trump warned of an enemies list filled with those who he views have “betrayed” him for attempting to hold him accountable for his attempt to overturn his 2020 election loss and his role in violent attack U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
“Our nation relies on dedicated, selfless public servants every day. They are the lifeblood of our democracy,” Biden said in a statement. “Yet alarmingly, public servants have been subjected to ongoing threats and intimidation for faithfully discharging their duties.”
Fauci was director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at the National Institutes of Health and was Biden’s chief medical advisor until his retirement in 2022. Trump soured on the doctor when Fauci refused to back his claims about Covid-19 and has since blamed him for mask mandates and other policies.
Biden also pardoned five members of his family with just minutes left in his presidency, saying he wanted to protect them from politically motivated investigations.
“My family has been subjected to unrelenting attacks and threats, motivated solely by a desire to hurt me — the worst kind of partisan politics,” Biden said. “Unfortunately, I have no reason to believe these attacks will end.”
The decision to pardon members of his family was due to Trump’s public vow to appoint a special prosecutor to “go after” Biden and his family, according to a source familiar with his thinking.
In an interview with CNN in 2020, Biden criticized the idea of an outgoing president’s pre-emptively pardoning family members. At the time, it was suggested that it was such a move Trump might take.
“It concerns me, in terms of what kind of precedent it sets and how the rest of the world looks at us as a nation of laws and justice,” Biden said then. “Now, in terms of the pardons, you’re not going to see, in our administration, that kind of approach.”
Trump told a reporter between inaugural events at the Capitol that it was “unfortunate” that Biden issued the pardons.
