MSNBC podcast co-host and legal analyst Andrew Weissmann argued that President Biden’s conduct regarding his son Hunter Biden’s guilty verdict on Tuesday proves the chief executive has the utmost respect for the rule of law.
During an appearance on "MSNBC Reports" following the younger Biden's conviction on federal charges regarding him buying and owning a firearm while addicted to drugs, the legal expert praised the president for not getting in the way of his Department of Justice’s prosecution of his own son.
"You have a president of the United States who is living embodiment of the rule of law," Weissmann told MSNBC host José Díaz-Balart.
A Delaware jury found Biden guilty of making a false statement in the purchase of a gun, making a false statement related to information required to be kept by a federally licensed gun dealer and possession of a gun by a person who is an unlawful user of or addicted to a controlled substance.
From the outset of his appearance, Weissmann said he was less interested in the "particulars" of the case than what it said about the convict’s father, especially when compared to how former President Trump handled his own recent guilty verdict and the rule of law in general.
"This is a gun charge. The proof was overwhelming," Weissmann, a former FBI general counsel, said. "I agree with your other panelists that it is rarely charged. In my experience, over 21 years at the department, I never saw this kind of case brought. It would normally be somebody who is a felon in possession of a gun that would be charged."
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"I am more interested in what it tells us about the rule of law in this country in two ways: One, the son of the sitting president was pretty quickly tried. He was given due process, and he was found guilty," Weissmann continued. "And you have the current president, the father of the defendant, making it absolutely clear that he is not pardoning him, that he could have ordered at any time his Justice Department to get rid of this case. He did not do that."
Weissmann stressed that all this proves how committed President Biden is to upholding the rule of law, stressing that’s the "big picture" of this verdict.
"You really can contrast that to the former president’s denigration of the rule of law," Weissmann said. "Every single time [Trump] is found either guilty in a criminal case or liable in a civil case, including sexual assault and fraud, he says the system’s rigged against him."
"So, I think that that to me is the really strong contrast between the two views of the institution of the justice system, whether it’s civil justice or criminal justice, that I think is speaking to me very loudly about the impact and the import of this case," he added.
Fox News Digital's Emma Colton, Brooke Singman contributed to this report.
