Pardon Trump?

In his Washington Post column Mark Thiemann and Danielle Pietka argue that President Biden should pardon Donald Trump:

In his 2020 victory speech, Joe Biden declared that “to everything there is a season — a time to build, a time to reap, a time to sow. And a time to heal. This is the time to heal in America.” If he wants to deliver on his promise to heal the country, he could do so with one action:

Pardon Donald Trump.

On the merits, the case against Trump is damning. And it doesn’t take a close reading of the federal indictment to understand that the former president’s problems are of his own making. He allegedly showed a writer classified material about Iran, saying, “This is secret information. Look, look at this.” And he obstructed the FBI’s efforts to recover classified material in his possession, even allegedly telling his lawyer, “Wouldn’t it be better if we just told them we don’t have anything here?” Had he simply returned the documents, as Mike Pence did when it became clear he had classified papers, Trump almost certainly would not have been charged, as Pence has not been. His misconduct was egregious, irresponsible and probably criminal. Anyone else would be seeking a plea bargain.

But his indictment has also put our nation into uncharted territory. The threshold for the sitting president’s administration to indict the leading candidate of the opposing party should be extraordinarily high. High enough to mitigate the suspicion held by 80 percent of Republicans and almost half the nation, per ABC News-Ipsos polling, that these charges are politically motivated. Indeed, millions of Americans believe that our legal system is being weaponized against Trump — and, by extension, against them.

Most Americans don’t look at this indictment in a vacuum. They see it in the context of the decisions not to prosecute Hillary Clinton for her mishandling of classified information; the Trump-Russia collusion investigation, which paralyzed our country for two years over a conspiracy theory; two impeachments and Trump’s politicized indictment by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg; and the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story that could have damaged Joe Biden and aided Trump’s 2020 campaign. They see a troubling pattern, and they are not wrong.

and this is the editors of the Washington Post’s response:

If Mr. Trump loses in court, on appeal and at the ballot box, it would prove no one is above the law in the American system. Whoever is president might then consider offering clemency to spare the republic the indignity of incarcerating its former commander in chief. Letting Mr. Trump off the hook before that happens would inevitably lead him to falsely claim vindication, even exoneration. A pardon might become warranted if it coincides with the end of Mr. Trump’s political career. But the country is still a long way from that moment.

In all likelihood the trials (there will be more than one) will still be going on in November 2024. When President Gerald Ford pardoned Richard Nixon it marked the effective end of both of their political careers. I cannot imagine President Biden doing so whether it marks the end of Donald Trump’s political career or not. I cannot imagine a newly-elected President Christie or DeSantis wanting to.