The 21 key lines from Karine Jean-Pierre's "pardon" press conference

Whoa boy.

Since he announced that he would pardon his son on Sunday night, Hunter, President Joe Biden has not spoken publicly about the controversial decision. Instead, he jetted to Angola for his final foreign trip as president — and studiously avoided the media.

But, White House press secretary Karine Jean Pierre wasn’t able to dodge the media. On the flight to Africa, she took reporters’ questions about the pardon — why Biden did it, why he previously said he wouldn’t and what changed.

I went through the transcript of Jean Pierre’s presser and picked out the lines you need to see. They’re below.

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So, do it:

To the Lines!

1. “Well, first of all, one of the things that the president always believes is to be truthful to the American people. That is something that he always truly believes.”

“I said I’d abide by the jury decision, and I will do that. And I will not pardon him.” — Joe Biden, June 2024. And away we go!

2. “And I would encourage everyone to read it full, the president's statement.”

Agree! You can read the whole thing here. The line from it that really jumped out to me? “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.” That sounds a lot like something the incoming president would (and has) said.

3. “He came to this decision this weekend. So, let's be very clear about that. He says it himself. It's in his voice. He said he came to this decision this weekend.”

But, to be clear, Biden has been thinking about doing just this for a while now. This is from the New York Times: “Mr. Biden had been privately grappling with the decision to pardon his son since shortly after Hunter Biden was convicted on federal gun charges in June.”

4. “And because he believes in the justice system.”

But, like, no? Or at least not completely? Because Biden, in his statement, said that his son had been the victim of “selective prosecution.” And he quite clearly pardoned Hunter for fear of what the justice system would do to Hunter under a President Trump.

5. “He also said that no reasonable person, if you are looking at this in a good-faith way, if you are looking at the facts of Hunter's cases and can reach -- you can't reach any other conclusion, right?”

Then why did Biden (and Jean-Pierre) say repeatedly — and with no wiggle room — that the president wouldn’t pardon his son? If this was such an obvious miscarriage of justice why didn’t Biden pardon Hunter right after the verdict in June? Or at any point before the election? I mean, we all know the answer.