First, Form 4473 is unconstitutional.
Focusing on this case, if Biden does not commute his son’s sentence, the president’s son, who faces up to 25 years in prison can still challenge his prosecution on Second Amendment grounds. This should be interesting.
A federal jury in Delaware today found Hunter Biden guilty of three felonies based on his purchase of a revolver from a Wilmington gun shop in October 2018. That outcome is not surprising, since Biden had publicly admitted that he was a regular crack cocaine user around the time of the transaction. But Biden can still challenge the verdict by arguing that his prosecution violated the Second Amendment—a claim that pits him against his own father.
The central charge against the president’s son was a violation of 18 USC 922(g)(3), which makes it a felony for an “unlawful user” of a “controlled substance” to receive or possess a firearm. The two other charges, also felonies, involved Biden’s misrepresentation of himself as a legal gun buyer. Biden faces combined maximum penalties of up to 25 years in prison, although his actual sentence is apt to be much shorter, assuming he is incarcerated at all.
In his 2021 memoir Beautiful Things, Biden described a crack addiction that extended from the spring of 2018 into 2019, featuring several “bullshit attempt[s] to get well.” His defense hinged on the improbable and legally iffy suggestion that he bought and possessed the gun during a brief window when he was sober and did not view himself as an illegal drug user or addict.
By Jacob Sullum
