Speaker 1: Welcome back to The Michael Cohen Show on our continued
journey to two hundred and fifty thousand subscribers. So if
you like what you hear, and I think you should
share with a friend and hit the subscribe button and
make sure you watch to the end because the reactions
are all important. So I want to talk now about yesterday,
something really big happened. President Biden decided, despite all of
the statements made by everybody early on that he would
never do it, he pardoned his son Hunter Biden. Now
I want to show you part of Biden's statement. Okay,
first part saying today I signed a pardon for my
son Hunter. 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 without aggravating factors
like use in a crime, multiple purchases, or buying a
weapon as a straw. People are almost never brought to
trial on felony charges solely for how they filled out
a gun form. Those who were paying their taxes because
of serious addictions, but pay them back subsequently with interest
and penalties are typically given non criminal resolutions. It is
clear that Hunter was treated differently by the way. Wait
for my reaction, because that's what happened to me. Now.
The charges in his cases came about only after several
of my political opponents in Congress instigated them to attack
me and oppose my election. Then a carefully negotiated plea
deal agreed to buy the Department of Justice unraveled in
the courtroom, with a number of my political opponents in
Congress taking credit for bringing political pressure on the process.
Had the plea deal held, it would have been a
fair reasonable resolution of Hunter's case. Next part. But my
entire career I have followed a simple principle. Just tell
the American people the truth. They'll be fair minded. Here's
the truth. I believe in the justice system. But as
I have wrestled with this, I also believe raw politics
has infected this process and it led to a miscarriage
of justice. And once I made this decision this weekend,
there was no sense in delaying it further. I hope
Americans will understand why a father and a president would
come to this decision. Now, let me be very clear
about something. There's so much in there that if you
took out the name Hunter Biden and you inserted Michael Cohen,
you should come to the same decision. I have never
in my life filed a late tax return. I have
never not paid my taxes. All right, there was an error.
There was an error by my CPA, by my accountant
who I had for years, made a mistake, and instead
of sending me a letter like every other American would
get mine on a Friday at five point thirty pm,
you either come in on Monday and plead guilty, or
we file an eighty page indictment against your wife. Now,
got to tell you got a little bit of an
issue with the fact that he should have come out
earlier and said as a father, because everyone would understand this,
and I believe every single father out there would do
that for their child. Turn around and say my son
has battled some massive addiction and he is clean, and
I am proud of him. And yes he's screwed up.
I understand that. But under no circumstance am I going
to allow him in order to become let's just say
the butt of this scenario as a result of me
becoming president of the United States. But here's the problem.
It opens up now the opportunity for Republicans for Donald
Trump to do what he has said from day number
one that he intends to do, and that's to pardon
all of the January sixth insurrectionists. Oh, I'm sorry, hostages
as he describes them. So whatever the adjective that you
want to use to describe him, Donald Trump was at
least honest when he said that he is going to
pardon these individuals. Now, again, we have to wait and
see whether or not he actually does this. But I
wish that Joe Biden and we would have all turned
around and come to the same conclusion. Now, enough is enough.
Family is off limits. Stop and I'm not going to
allow my son to get pushed back into the regressive
situation that he was in. And as a father and
as the president of the United States, he will pay
back his penalties, he will pay the fine, he will
pay back the tax amount, But you're not going to
put him in jail for something that only Michael Cohen
has been held accountable for, only me, first time offender ever.
Never ask for an extension. No overseas businesses, no overseas nominees.
It's not care everything was in Capital One Bank, which,
by the way, by Kuinky Dink, was located at the
base of the fucking building that I live in, which
is a Trump building. So look, I wanted sort of
give you the opposite belief, okay, And I want to
show you, for example, what represented the jasmine. Crockett had
to say about the pardon. Play the clip.
Speaker 2: Well, I want Presant to speak for the entire caucus,
but I will say, way to go, Joe. Let me
be the first one to congratulate the President for deciding
to do this, because at the end of the day,
we know that we have a thirty four account convicted
fella in that is about to walk into the White House.
So for anyone that wants to clutch their pearls now
because he decided that he was going to pardon his son,
I would say, take a look in the mirror, because
we also know that when it comes to this cabinet,
this cabinet has more people accused of sexual assault than
any incoming cabinet probably ever in the history of America.
So we are living in unprecedented times and we know
that this was completely political. As someone who serves on
the Oversight Committee, this was gangsmanship the entire time.
Speaker 1: And yeah, like I said, everybody's entitled to their opinion.
And I happen to think that Jasmine Crockett is phenomenal.
I love when she's talking because she goes right to
the right for the jugular. But again, now you cannot equate,
for example, what's going on with Pete Hegseth or with
some of the other nominees like the Matt Gates nomination,
to what's going on here with Joe and Hunter Biden.
I say he should have done this earlier. He shouldn't
have played the political game. He should have turned around
and said, I'm the president of the United States, and
as far as I'm concerned, what's going on with my
son is wrong, and I'm not going to allow it.
Very much like I think that they should turn around
be talking about Michael Cohen. Why why a guy who
was again never in his entire life not paid his taxes.
I paid millions and millions in taxes over the years,
and I've never filed for a late for a late
tax return until twenty seventeen. First time offender who gets
a six year sentence politically motivated Now I want to
also show you what Jill Wyne Banks, a friend of
mine former Watergate prosecutor, had to say about the pardon
as well. Play that clip.
Speaker 2: Okay, Jill, let me start with you your initial reactions
or your reaction to President Biden pardning his son.
Speaker 3: I am relieved and thrilled that he did it. I
think this was one of those cases that call out
for clemency. Hunter Biden, first of all, would not have
ever been prosecuted for the gun crime but for his
last name. Second of all, he was addicted, and that
was a cause of his actions. He has now been
sober for many years, and this is a time when
it is really appropriate for a grant of clemency.
Speaker 1: You see, and as I said before, when I was discussing,
Congresswoman Crockett's response would have been the same exact response,
and one would have to expect that the shoe was
on the other foot. Trump would do that for any
of his children as well. He should have, and as
far as I'm concerned, Joe Biden should have done this earlier.
It's the right move. Enough is enough This usage of
the Department of Justice, including like what Judge Alvin K.
Hellerstein turned around and said when they unc constitutionally remanded
me back to prison because I refused to waive my
First Amendment constitutional right off of the counterfeit document, when
he said that the actions of Bill Barr and Donald
Trump's administration were retaliatory and unconstitutional. My friends, this is
why right now there's such a divide in this country.
If I turned around and I showed you a bunch
of clips from Fox News or from NEWSMAXAAN, it would
of course be contradictory to what you heard from Jasmine
Crockett and from Jill Wayne Banks. Were so divided, and
it's enough right now the usage of the Department of
Justice to go after individuals, whether it's retaliation, whether it's retribution,
whether it's for any for anything, if you commit a crime,
then you should be prosecuted. As we all know, Hunter
Biden was due for sentencing this month. So Joe Biden
did what he needed to do to protect his family,
as I'm certain anybody would. And it's with that that
I turn around, I say, it is so important that
all this bullshit stop. One of the reasons that I
constantly fight as hard as I do is because the
unconstitutional remand of me, I took it to the Supreme
Court via a writ of Sir Shiirai. They refused to
hear it. How How the first and only political prisoner
held by his own country, the United States of America,
because I refused to waive my First Amendment constitutional right
and they didn't want to hear this case? How why
the political horseshit that I have dealt with. Nobody knows
it better than I, and I actually applaud Joe Biden
for doing this. I would have liked him to have
done it earlier. He didn't, Okay, I think it's the
right move. I do think it opens up the door
for Donald Trump to do what he has said continuously
at just about every single rally that he intends to
do with the January sixth insurrectionists, hostages, whatever you want
to call them, and nobody will be able to then
turn around and say that he shouldn't do it, because
he's doing exactly what he said that he was going
to do. And that opens up again more floodgate, for
more vitriolic rhetoric against one another, Republican versus democrat, Democrat
versus Republican. Let's just hope that over the course of
the next four years, once Trump is inaugurated, that all
this bullshit comes to an end, that we all decide
that we're all Americans, like the way that we all
behaved after nine to eleven. It's enough. Trust me, I
know as somebody who's the victim of the over prosecution,
not because my last name is Trump, but because of
my affiliation to him. And with that, I want to
say again thanks for listening. Hey everyone, First of all,
thanks for watching. I mean, we're going to be posting
daily episodes with reactions and talking about politics. We'll be
talking about everything in fact, so please like and subscribe
join us on this journey.