What Hunter Biden tells us about America

It is the universe’s little joke that America’s first trial of the child of a sitting president began four days after its first conviction of a former president. Hunter Biden is not being persecuted. Nor is the president’s surviving son the victim of a rigged judiciary. If Biden Jr is convicted there will be no uproar about the weaponisation of America’s courts. If, on the other hand, he is acquitted, all conspiratorial hell will break loose. 

It is easy to forget that America’s rule of law is still intact. Both Donald Trump and Hunter Biden have been given trials by jury with the right of appeal. No system of justice is beyond reproach. But in America, defendants remain innocent until proven guilty. It is the mark of a blighted political culture when one of its two main parties treats the rule of law as a partisan issue. 

To recap, Trump was unanimously convicted last week on all 34 counts of falsifying business records to disguise election payments. Trump afterwards called the presiding judge “a devil” and said he was the victim of a show trial. Almost to a person, his party echoed that line. The notable exception, Larry Hogan — the Republican Senate candidate in Maryland — was targeted for his effrontery. 

Hogan’s offence was to ask Americans to “respect the verdict and the legal process”. In response to that, Trump’s daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, who chairs the Republican National Committee, said: “[Hogan] doesn’t deserve the respect of anyone in the Republican Party at this point, and quite frankly, anybody in America.” In short, Republicans who reject the claim of a rigged judiciary are subject to cancellation. 

I have no idea whether Hunter Biden will be convicted. The “first son” is alleged to have lied on a federal form in 2018 to acquire a firearm illegally. His gun was handed in to the police 11 days later after Biden Jr’s then girlfriend — the widow of his late older brother, Beau Biden — had thrown it away. Hallie Biden was worried that Biden Jr’s crack habit would not mix well with possessing a revolver. 

The prosecution must prove that Biden Jr knowingly lied when he said that he was not using drugs when he bought the gun. His is the sorry tale of a political scion who in his own words had hit “rock bottom”. That Biden Jr also monetised his father’s name is a poor reflection on how Washington works. He made much of his money when his father was vice-president by joining the board of a Ukrainian energy company. With no special qualifications for that role, he was clearly hired because of his last name. 

Money will always try to buy influence. There is no sure guardrail against such abuse other than integrity. By the same token, Jared Kushner would not have received $2bn in Saudi investment for his private equity firm in 2021 were he not the son-in-law of the former president. Americans can agree that their capital city is lacking in ethics. But disapproving of that is radically different to believing outlandish nonsense about Moscow-style show trials. 

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The Trump and Biden cases are a tale of two parties. Biden could have spared his son his judicial ordeal by pardoning him — a tool that Trump used for political associates who were jailed. Biden could also pre-emptively pardon his son before his separate trial for tax fraud in California. Biden Jr’s second trial begins in early September just as the formal US general election is getting under way. If his father is rigging the system, he has a funny way of showing it. 

Steve Bannon, one of Trump’s former strategists (also a convicted criminal), once admitted that the Trump movement’s real enemy was the media. “The way to deal with them is to flood the zone with shit,” he said. The more nonsense that is pumped out, the more easily a cynical public will damn everyone equally.

Amid the rivers of effluence about Trump’s victimhood, it is easy to forget that he has almost certainly avoided trial for trying to overturn an election. Later this month, the US Supreme Court will rule on Trump’s claim to immunity for anything he did while he was president. By prevaricating for months over what should be an open-and-shut decision, the conservative-dominated court has all but ensured that Trump will escape accountability. 

Hunter Biden may or may not merit jail time. Ditto Trump in his hush money case. But these are mere sideshows. One of America’s potential presidents respects the rule of law. The other does not. Everything else pales in comparison. 

edward.luce@ft.com