Latest news with #DavidWeiss
Fox News
5 days ago
- Business
- Fox News
Here are Biden's most controversial pardons, with most signed using AutoPen
The Justice Department is reviewing the list of people that were granted pardons by former President Joe Biden, amid new concerns about his use of an AutoPen to automatically sign documents, as well as concerns about his state of mind and mental acuity in his final months in office. Biden used his final weeks as commander-in-chief to grant clemency and pardon more than 1,500 individuals, in what his White House described as the largest single-day act of clemency by a U.S. president. But critics blasted Biden for some of the pardons and preemptive pardons for members of his family, inner circle, and some allies, amid concerns that the Trump administration would investigate and attempt to punish their actions. Biden signed the pardon for his son, Hunter Biden, by hand. But the others appear to have been signed by AutoPen. Here is a list of the former president's most controversial pardons: Former President Biden pardoned his son Hunter Biden in December 2024—after vowing to the American people for months that he would not do so. Hunter Biden was found guilty of three felony firearm offenses stemming from Special Counsel David Weiss' investigation. The first son was also charged with federal tax crimes regarding the failure to pay at least $1.4 million in taxes. Before his trial, Hunter Biden entered a surprise guilty plea. Biden, in December, announced a blanket pardon that applies to any offenses against the U.S. that Hunter Biden "has committed or may have committed" from Jan. 1, 2014, to Dec. 1, 2024. "From the day I took office, I said I would not interfere with the Justice Department's decision-making, and I kept my word even as I have watched my son being selectively, and unfairly, prosecuted," Biden said. "There has been an effort to break Hunter — who has been five and a half years sober, even in the face of unrelenting attacks and selective prosecution. In trying to break Hunter, they've tried to break me — and there's no reason to believe it will stop here. Enough is enough." Biden added, "I hope Americans will understand why a father and a president would come to this decision." Just a day before leaving office on Jan. 20, 2025, Biden signed an Executive Grant of Clemency for his brother James Biden and his wife Sarah Jones Biden; his sister Valerie Biden Owens and her husband John T. Owens; and his brother Francis W. Biden. The "full and unconditional" preemptive pardon for his family members covered "any nonviolent offenses against the United States which they may have committed or taken part in during the period from Jan. 1, 2014, through the date of this pardon," which was signed on Jan. 19, 2025. The pardon appears to have been signed with AutoPen. Members of the Biden family had fallen at the center of the congressional investigation into their business dealings. The House of Representatives launched an impeachment inquiry against Biden, finding that Biden committed "impeachable conduct" during his time as vice president and "defrauded the United States to enrich his family." During the inquiry, congressional investigators heard testimony from James Biden, who ultimately was referred to the Justice Department for prosecution for making false statements to Congress about "key aspects" of the impeachment inquiry. The House of Representatives found that the Biden family and its associates received more than $27 million from foreign individuals or entities since 2014. They also alleged that the Biden family leveraged Biden's position as vice president to obtain more than $8 million in loans from Democrat benefactors. The loans "have not been repaid and the paperwork supporting many of the loans does not exist and has not been produced to the committees." The Republicans said the alleged conspiracy took place while Biden was serving as vice president. Biden, on Jan. 19, 2025, pardoned Milley, after an administration marred by the disastrous Afghanistan withdrawal. Milley, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has admitted the withdrawal where 13 U.S. troops lost their lives was a "strategic failure." "My family and I are deeply grateful for the President's action today," Milley said in a statement, accepting the pardon. "After forty-three years of faithful service in uniform to our Nation, protecting and defending the Constitution, I do not wish to spend whatever remaining time the Lord grants me fighting those who unjustly might seek retribution for perceived slights." The pardon appears to have been signed with AutoPen. Biden, also on Jan. 19, 2025, pardoned former Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Dr. Anthony Fauci. Fauci also served as Biden's chief medical advisor and oversaw the U.S. public health response and research on the COVID-19 virus and vaccine development. Fauci accepted the pardon in a statement shortly after Biden announced the move, claiming he was subject to "politically motivated threats of investigation and prosecution." "Let me be perfectly clear: I have committed no crime and there are no possible grounds for any allegation or threat of criminal investigation or prosecution of me. The fact is, however, that the mere articulation of these baseless threats, and the potential that they will be acted upon, create immeasurable and intolerable distress for me and my family. For these reasons, I acknowledge and appreciate the action that President Biden has taken today on my behalf," Fauci said. Fauci's pardon also appears to have been signed with AutoPen. Biden, also on Jan. 19, 2025, used AutoPen to sign a pardon for members of Congress who served on the House Select Committee to investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. The pardon also covered committee staff and the police officers from the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department and the U.S. Capitol Police who testified before the committee.
CNN
6 days ago
- Health
- CNN
‘It is a whole different environment': Republicans revisit key Biden investigations with new momentum
The House Judiciary Committee is expected to interview former Hunter Biden special counsel David Weiss behind closed doors on Friday, two sources familiar with the interview told CNN, as part of a broader Republican effort to revisit previous probes into the Biden family that stalled last Congress but are gaining new momentum now that Republicans control both chambers of Congress and the White House. The scheduled interview, which could still be moved, would be the second time the Republican-led panel will interview Weiss about his work as Republicans continue to probe whether the investigation was hampered by political interference. Weiss has still never testified publicly about his six-year criminal probe into the president's son, which included three convictions, but was ultimately short-circuited as a result of the former president's unconditional pardon of his son. House Judiciary Republicans have long wanted to call Weiss, the Trump-appointed US attorney, back for questioning after his first closed-door interview in 2023. Committee Republicans were also able to finally secure interviews with two Department of Justice tax division prosecutors involved in the Hunter Biden probe who they had been aggressively pursuing for months, one of the sources familiar told CNN. The Justice Department is working with Weiss to provide access to documents he may need for his interview, a person briefed on the matter said. Any delays in getting access to documents would be a scheduling issue and the ability to have personnel who can oversee it, the person briefed on the matter said. It's not the only Biden investigation Republicans are reexamining that leans into a fresh political appetite with GOP control of Washington. House Oversight Chair James Comer is returning to his probe of the former president's mental fitness in an entirely new landscape after a recent book by CNN's Jake Tapper and Axios' Alex Thompson put Joe Biden's physical and mental decline back in the spotlight. Comer told CNN he is in the process of scheduling key interviews with Biden's White House physician, Dr. Kevin O'Connor, and other senior aides who had all rebuffed his efforts last Congress. Beyond the five initial interviews from Biden's orbit, the Republican Chairman told CNN he wants to look at the executive orders Biden signed in his last six months in office and use of the autopen. In the weeks immediately after Biden's disastrous 2024 debate performance that unraveled his presidential campaign and upended the Democratic party, Comer requested to interview Biden's doctor and subpoenaed three senior Biden aides to discuss their roles in the Biden White House, which never materialized. Now, Comer said in an interview with CNN, 'it is a whole different environment.' At the time of his 2024 interview requests, Comer's impeachment inquiry into the Biden family's business dealings had fallen apart and the Biden administration felt no incentive to comply with the House Oversight Committee. Probing Biden's decline now, Comer says, will be a lot easier than trying to convince his colleagues of an alleged Biden family foreign influence peddling scheme, which even Comer conceded was difficult to do, particularly in a minute or less on Fox News. Republicans failed to uncover evidence to support their core allegations against the president, and lacked the votes in their divided, narrow majority last Congress to impeach the president. 'The money laundering and the shell companies, the average American couldn't understand that. I mean, that was hard to understand,' Comer told CNN. 'You know, I did not do a good job explaining that.' But with his investigation into Biden's mental and physical decline, Comer said, 'people see a president that clearly is in decline. They saw it in the debate.' Democrats sought to dismantle the Republican-led 11 month impeachment inquiry into Biden last Congress at every turn. Comer told CNN that although those Democrats aren't jumping at the opportunity to cooperate now, he does not see them as being obstructive either. 'I take that as a step in the right direction,' he told CNN. Tapper and Thompson's book documents how Biden, his closest aides and his family forged ahead with the former president's doomed 2024 reelection bid despite signs of his physical and mental decline. In a previous statement to CNN, a Biden spokesman criticized the book, saying that evidence shows that 'he was a very effective president.' Former Democratic Rep. Dean Phillips, who launched a long-shot challenge to Biden and was outspoken about his concerns over the former president's age, told CNN he did not think there needed to be an investigation on Capitol Hill at this point into Biden's fitness as president. 'This case already went to trial, the jury of American voters convicted the party of the accused, and handed out the harshest political punishment possible-losing the single most consequential election in modern history,' Phillips told CNN. Instead, Phillips called on Biden to authorize his physician to disclose his health file and condition under oath. 'Only if the former president refuses, or if questioning uncovers possible criminal activity, should an investigation be initiated,' Phillips added. Biden was recently diagnosed with an 'aggressive form' of prostate cancer.
CNN
6 days ago
- Business
- CNN
‘It is a whole different environment': Republicans revisit key Biden investigations with new momentum
The House Judiciary Committee is expected to interview former Hunter Biden special counsel David Weiss behind closed doors on Friday, two sources familiar with the interview told CNN, as part of a broader Republican effort to revisit previous probes into the Biden family that stalled last Congress but are gaining new momentum now that Republicans control both chambers of Congress and the White House. The scheduled interview, which could still be moved, would be the second time the Republican-led panel will interview Weiss about his work as Republicans continue to probe whether the investigation was hampered by political interference. Weiss has still never testified publicly about his six-year criminal probe into the president's son, which included three convictions, but was ultimately short-circuited as a result of the former president's unconditional pardon of his son. House Judiciary Republicans have long wanted to call Weiss, the Trump-appointed US attorney, back for questioning after his first closed-door interview in 2023. Committee Republicans were also able to finally secure interviews with two Department of Justice tax division prosecutors involved in the Hunter Biden probe who they had been aggressively pursuing for months, one of the sources familiar told CNN. The Justice Department is working with Weiss to provide access to documents he may need for his interview, a person briefed on the matter said. Any delays in getting access to documents would be a scheduling issue and the ability to have personnel who can oversee it, the person briefed on the matter said. It's not the only Biden investigation Republicans are reexamining that leans into a fresh political appetite with GOP control of Washington. House Oversight Chair James Comer is returning to his probe of the former president's mental fitness in an entirely new landscape after a recent book by CNN's Jake Tapper and Axios' Alex Thompson put Joe Biden's physical and mental decline back in the spotlight. Comer told CNN he is in the process of scheduling key interviews with Biden's White House physician, Dr. Kevin O'Connor, and other senior aides who had all rebuffed his efforts last Congress. Beyond the five initial interviews from Biden's orbit, the Republican Chairman told CNN he wants to look at the executive orders Biden signed in his last six months in office and use of the autopen. In the weeks immediately after Biden's disastrous 2024 debate performance that unraveled his presidential campaign and upended the Democratic party, Comer requested to interview Biden's doctor and subpoenaed three senior Biden aides to discuss their roles in the Biden White House, which never materialized. Now, Comer said in an interview with CNN, 'it is a whole different environment.' At the time of his 2024 interview requests, Comer's impeachment inquiry into the Biden family's business dealings had fallen apart and the Biden administration felt no incentive to comply with the House Oversight Committee. Probing Biden's decline now, Comer says, will be a lot easier than trying to convince his colleagues of an alleged Biden family foreign influence peddling scheme, which even Comer conceded was difficult to do, particularly in a minute or less on Fox News. Republicans failed to uncover evidence to support their core allegations against the president, and lacked the votes in their divided, narrow majority last Congress to impeach the president. 'The money laundering and the shell companies, the average American couldn't understand that. I mean, that was hard to understand,' Comer told CNN. 'You know, I did not do a good job explaining that.' But with his investigation into Biden's mental and physical decline, Comer said, 'people see a president that clearly is in decline. They saw it in the debate.' Democrats sought to dismantle the Republican-led 11 month impeachment inquiry into Biden last Congress at every turn. Comer told CNN that although those Democrats aren't jumping at the opportunity to cooperate now, he does not see them as being obstructive either. 'I take that as a step in the right direction,' he told CNN. Tapper and Thompson's book documents how Biden, his closest aides and his family forged ahead with the former president's doomed 2024 reelection bid despite signs of his physical and mental decline. In a previous statement to CNN, a Biden spokesman criticized the book, saying that evidence shows that 'he was a very effective president.' Former Democratic Rep. Dean Phillips, who launched a long-shot challenge to Biden and was outspoken about his concerns over the former president's age, told CNN he did not think there needed to be an investigation on Capitol Hill at this point into Biden's fitness as president. 'This case already went to trial, the jury of American voters convicted the party of the accused, and handed out the harshest political punishment possible-losing the single most consequential election in modern history,' Phillips told CNN. Instead, Phillips called on Biden to authorize his physician to disclose his health file and condition under oath. 'Only if the former president refuses, or if questioning uncovers possible criminal activity, should an investigation be initiated,' Phillips added. Biden was recently diagnosed with an 'aggressive form' of prostate cancer.
Daily Mail
09-05-2025
- Daily Mail
EXCLUSIVE Blood-chilling autopsy reveals how firing squad 'BOTCHED' execution of death row inmate
State marksmen missed the heart of a South Carolina cop killer who chose to die by firing squad last month, botching his execution and causing him to suffer an excruciating, prolonged end, his attorneys claim. Mikal Mahdi, 42, was put to death on April 11 for murdering an off-duty police officer in 2004. Mahdi's attorneys said he opted to be executed by firing squad over lethal injection or electrocution because he believed it would be the quickest and most painless method of the three options. However, an independent autopsy has suggested Mahdi's execution did not go according to plan and that the convicted killer endured pain well beyond the '10-to-15 second' window that was expected. In documents filed in the Supreme Court on Thursday, Mahdi's attorneys claim that the state's three marksmen shot their client lower than expected, missing his heart and striking him just above the abdomen, piercing his liver and pancreas. As the shots were fired, Mahdi cried out and his arms flexed, the AP reported. He was heard breathing and groaning for at least a minute after and wasn't officially pronounced dead for four minutes. 'The autopsy confirms what I saw and heard,' David Weiss, an attorney for Mikal Mahdi, told in a written statement. 'Mikal suffered an excruciating death. We don't know what went wrong, but nothing about his execution was humane. 'The implications are horrifying for anyone facing the same choice as Mikal. South Carolina's refusal to acknowledge their failures with executions cannot continue.' Mahdi, with a hood over his head, cried out as the three bullets to the heart hit him and his arms flexed. He groaned about 45 seconds afterward and his breaths continued for around 80 seconds before he took his final gasp Mahdi's death marked the second time a death row inmate has been executed by firing squad this year in South Carolina. The autopsy ordered by his attorneys found that Mahdi suffered only two distinct gunshot wounds to his torso, even though there were three gunmen, each possessing a live round. His lawyers believe the execution was botched because either the volunteer prison employees missed or the target over Mahdi's chest to mark the location of his heart wasn't properly placed. South Carolina's Corrections Department had earlier conducted its own autopsy on Mahdi, and suggested all three bullets had struck him, with two of them entering his body at the same spot and following the same path. That has happened before during target practice, Corrections Department spokeswoman Chrysti Shane said to AP on Thursday. Mahdi's legal team claimed the autopsy provided by the state was 'incredibly sparse, with far fewer details and photographs than normally issued.' They also claim that there isn't enough evidence to support the Corrections Department's claim that two bullets entered the same spot. 'The shooters missed the intended target area and the evidence indicates that he was struck by only two bullets, not the prescribed three,' said Dr. Jonathan Arden, the pathologist hired by Mahdi's team. Arden said it likely took Mahdi 30-60 seconds to lose consciousness, two to four times longer than predicted by experts hired by the state. During that time, Mahdi likely endured intense pain as his lungs attempted to expand against shattered ribs and a broken sternum, while also experiencing "air hunger" - a desperate, suffocating sensation - as his damaged lungs failed to draw in enough oxygen, according to Dr. Arden. 'Mr. Mahdi elected the firing squad, and this Court sanctioned it, based on the assumption that SCDC could be entrusted to carry out its straightforward steps: locating the heart; placing a target over it; and hitting that target,' Mahdi's attorneys wrote in a letter to the South Carolina Supreme Court. 'That confidence was clearly misplaced.' In a report summarizing his findings, Arden said the state's official autopsy did not include X-rays, which would have allowed for the results to be independently verified. Arden also said that only one photo was taken of Mahdi's body, and no close-ups of the wounds; and his clothing was not examined to determine where the target was placed and how it aligned with the damage the bullets caused to his shirt. 'I noticed where the target was placed on Mikal's torso, and I remember thinking to myself, 'I'm certainly not an expert in human anatomy, but it appears to me that target looks low,'' said Mahdi's attorney, David Weiss. Dr. Arden said that in his 40-year career, he has never heard of two bullets entering the same spot on a human body before. The autopsy found damage in only one of the four chambers of Mahdi's heart - the right ventricle. There was, however, extensive damage to his liver and pancreas, suggesting the marksmen aimed too low. In contrast, in the execution of Brad Sigmon, who was killed by firing squad in South Carolina in March - the first to be carried out in the US for 15 years - his autopsy showed three distinct bullet wounds and his heart was 'obliterated', Arden said. Sigmon's autopsy also included X-rays, multiple photographs, and an examination of his clothing. Without X-rays or other internal scans, the state's two-bullets-through-one-hole claim cannot be substantiated, Arden added. Attorney Weiss said the alleged errors in Mahdi's execution pose a major problem. 'I think that raises incredibly difficult questions about the type of training and oversight that is going into this process,' Weiss told AP. 'It was obvious to me, as a lay person, upon reading his autopsy report, that something went wrong here. 'We should want to figure out what it was that went wrong when you've got state government carrying out the most serious, most grave possible type of function.' Mahdi's body has since been cremated, preventing any further tests. The 42-year-old admitted to killing Public Safety officer James Myers in 2004, shooting him at least eight times before burning his body. Myers' charred remains were discovered by his wife in a shed in their backyard, which had been the backdrop to their wedding just over a year earlier. Mahdi also pleaded guilty to murdering a convenience store clerk three days before he killed Myers. He was arrested in Florida while driving Myers' unmarked police pickup truck. His attorneys had sought clemency from Governor Henry McMaster, but South Carolina's Republican chief executive has never granted any previous clemency petitions. 'Mr. Mahdi's life is a tragic story of a child abandoned at every step,' his lawyers said in a statement. When Mahdi was four years old, his mother fled her abusive husband, and the boy was raised by his volatile, mentally ill father, they said. 'Between the ages of 14 and 21, Mikal spent over 80 percent of his life in prison and lived through 8,000 hours in solitary confinement,' his lawyers said. 'Now 42, Mikal is deeply remorseful and a dramatically different person from the confused, angry, and abused youth who committed the capital crimes.' Mahdi's final appeal was rejected hours before his execution. His sentence was carried out on the evening of April 11 at the death chamber at a Columbia prison with fewer than a dozen witnesses sitting behind bulletproof glass. Mahdi was strapped to a chair, a hood put over his head, and a white square with a red bull's-eye was placed over his heart. He made no final statement before his death and avoided eye contact with the gathered witnesses. At his trial in 2004, prosecutor David Pascoe called Mahdi the 'epitome of evil.' 'His heart and mind are full of hate and malice,' Pascoe said.
CBS News
26-04-2025
- Entertainment
- CBS News
15th annual Sacramento Beer Week kicks off with Brewers Cup of California
SACRAMENTO — The 15th annual Sacramento Beer Week kicked off Friday. The festivities started with a stout competition at Crest Theater with more than 200 breweries vying for the title of California's best beer. The annual Brewers Cup of California is the largest event of its kind in the state, honoring craft beers in 64 categories. "California is one of the top beer states in the country, so why wouldn't we have a competition?" said David Weiss, president of the Sacramento Area Brewers Guild. And brewing beer has been a part of Sacramento's history dating back to the Gold Rush days. Many raw ingredients are still grown in the Central Valley. "We've got barley that's growing in this region. We've got heirloom varieties that have been here forever," Weiss said. "This whole region was a hop-growing region; 100 years ago, we were the largest producers of hops in the nation." Craft breweries are now in nearly every urban neighborhood. "A lot of breweries are very kid-friendly and dog-friendly, and so it just creates a very welcoming space," Weiss said. But there have been recent contractions in the industry, with some local spots going out of business. But brewers say that even in tough times, going out for a beer can be an economical extravagance. "Even if you can't afford some super nice things, you can go have a decent beer once or twice a week," Weiss said. "Times are tough, things are expensive but beer has always stood the test of time," said Chris Keeton of Alaro Craft Brewery. And the competition's top prize, the Best of Show, was won by Geisthaus Brewing, a Sacramento business that's only been open for 11 months. So what's their secret? "Just experience, understanding ingredients, and making the best beer we can," said Ben Allgood of Geisthaus Brewing. Sacramento Beer Week continues for the next nine days, with various tasting opportunities and events across the region.
