President Biden said on Thursday that he is commuting the sentences of nearly 1,500 people and pardoning 39 people convicted of nonviolent crimes in a sweeping act of clemency during his final weeks in office. The White House said it was the largest number of commutations by an American president in a single day.
The commutations affect those who had been released from prison and placed in home confinement during the coronavirus pandemic. The pardons are for people convicted of nonviolent crimes, including drug offenses.
“America was built on the promise of possibility and second chances,” Mr. Biden said in a statement. He said the clemency represented his commitment to “help reunite families, strengthen communities and reintegrate individuals back into society.”
A pardon wipes out a conviction, while a commutation leaves the guilty verdict intact but reduces some or all of the punishment.
Mr. Biden’s action was one of the biggest grants of clemency in modern American history. President Jimmy Carter, on his first day in office, issued a pardon that affected more people, for men who evaded the Vietnam War draft. But that was what is known as a categorical pardon; Mr. Biden’s commutations are for individual cases.
The announcement came two weeks after Mr. Biden issued a pardon for his son Hunter, who had been convicted of gun possession and pleaded guilty to income tax evasion. That decision was harshly criticized by both Republicans and Democrats because the president had long ruled out clemency for his son.
