[roenxi]

To believe that, they would have to believe he had done something that a prosecutor would object to and that was serious enough to get Fauci imprisoned. Which is to say, that he had committed a crime. If we're expecting it to be an arbitrary act of legal harassment, Trump's team could concoct something based on Fauci's work in 2013. Corruption isn't limited to a 2014-2025 window; unless they are basing it on facts.

[ripe]

As we have seen, Trump can hire prosecutors who will prosecute anybody he points his little finger at. He always hires lackeys, so it was easy to predict he would harass Fauci.

[roenxi]

So how will the pardon help? If the assumption is that the prosecutors are going to fabricate crimes, the pardon will only help if they fabricate a crime that happened under certain conditions (see: https://www.justice.gov/pardon/media/1385746/). If they're just making something up they can make something up and claim it happened in 2013.

The pardon doesn't protect him from harassment, it only protects him if he specifically committed crimes from 2014-2025 or in several official capacities. If the Trump team is just going to pretend they can say he did something 25 years ago in a private capacity and the pardon does nothing. The pardon only helps if he did something plausibly criminal recently (in which case there is a real question of why he got a pardon - they aren't supposed to be preemptive method of putting people above the law without even knowing what they did).

A charitable interpretation for Fauci is it is there to distract people from the numerous Biden-family pardons the same day and to stop people asking what they did (https://www.justice.gov/pardon/pardons-granted-president-jos... if anyone wants to look - C-f "Biden" & I count 4 that day + Hunter). But there are probably other things going on.

[ripe]

None of your links show any indications of crimes. I don't get the obsession with Fauci when there's an actual criminal using the Oval Office to harass innocent people every day.

This conversation is pointless. Have a nice day.

[ModernMech]

If they want to prosecute him they'll have to state a rationale to get around the pardon. That rationale will be used to prosecute them when they pardon themselves. If they want to weaken the pardon power, they are welcome to. Biden ensured they have to go to maximum lawlessness if they want to do that. They have the power to, no one is disputing that. But in choosing to exercise that power, they will hang a sword over their heads.

[philwelch]

Actually it's not that hard. The main legal avenue to invalidate the Biden pardons would be to argue that Biden never actually issued the pardons. He didn't sign them (the autopen did) and given his mental state there's no clear evidence that he was even aware of them. Trump, in contrast, routinely signs executive orders and pardons with news cameras in the Oval Office with him, while chatting with journalists. So it would be hard to argue that Trump was not the one actually issuing them.

[ModernMech]

If that's all it takes to invalidate a pardon, it would indeed severely weaken the power.