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This morning I was on Chicago drive time radio with Dan Proft and Amy Jacobson. This is my segment:

It was an interesting conversation as always, but Dan asked me about something I hadn’t thought much about: will Joe Biden follow up on his pardon of Hunter by pardoning people like Anthony Fauci, Adam Schiff, and Liz Cheney? Politico says that such pardons may be in the works:

President Joe Biden’s senior aides are conducting a vigorous internal debate over whether to issue preemptive pardons to a range of current and former public officials who could be targeted with President-elect Donald Trump’s return to the White House, according to senior Democrats familiar with the discussions.

Biden’s aides are deeply concerned about a range of current and former officials who could find themselves facing inquiries and even indictments, a sense of alarm which has only accelerated since Trump last weekend announced the appointment of Kash Patel to lead the FBI. Patel has publicly vowed to pursue Trump’s critics.

Note the conflation of “inquiries” and “indictments.” As for inquiries, yes, by all means! But indictments?

The White House officials, however, are carefully weighing the extraordinary step of handing out blanket pardons to those who’ve committed no crimes, both because it could suggest impropriety, only fueling Trump’s criticisms, and because those offered preemptive pardons may reject them.

Extraordinary, indeed. Much as I detest Adam Schiff, I have no idea what crime he may have committed. He is a notorious liar, most outrageously about the Russia collusion hoax. But for a politician to lie is not a crime, nor should Republicans want to normalize prosecuting politicians for “misinformation.” Likewise with Liz Cheney and Anthony Fauci, although Fauci’s obscure financial dealings might possibly have violated some federal law. I don’t know.

Those who could face exposure include such members of Congress’ Jan. 6 Committee as Sen.-elect Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) and former GOP Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming. Trump has previously said Cheney “should go to Jail along with the rest of the Unselect Committee!” Also mentioned by Biden’s aides for a pardon is Anthony Fauci, the former head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases who became a lightning rod for criticism from the right during the Covid-19 pandemic.

It seems blindingly obvious that Trump’s suggestion that all of the members of Nancy Pelosi’s absurdly stacked January 6 committee should go to jail was political hyperbole, not a comment on the criminal law. I suppose what is going on here is that Democrats can’t let go of their image of Trump as an incipient fascist dictator. The idea that he will bring criminal charges against political opponents–what charges? Politico doesn’t even hint at an answer–fits with their fantasies.

And, of course, they are aware that what they now fear from Trump is exactly what they did to him. Democrats brought some of the most ridiculous federal and state criminal prosecutions ever seen against Trump, and still couldn’t stop him from being elected. So I suppose it is natural that they might expect Trump to be as insanely partisan as they were, even though they never thought of themselves as fascist dictators.

I hope that Biden does issue preemptive pardons to those mentioned in Politico’s story, and others. That would suggest that they have committed crimes, without anyone going to the trouble of asserting such a theory. It would be a political hit to the Democratic Party.

But if Trump is smart, the last thing he will focus on is legal retribution against Democrats. He is busily staffing an administration that will be ready to hit the ground on January 20. Without even being inaugurated, he is carrying more weight in foreign policy than Joe Biden ever did in four years in office. On the first day of his administration, he will be able to issue critically important orders to enforce federal law and seal the southern border.

Trump is ascendant. The last thing he needs is to create side issues with ill-advised criminal investigations and prosecutions of political opponents, which would mostly serve to make those opponents into sympathetic figures, and distract from the popular measures that Trump and his administration will be taking.

To paraphrase an adage from decades ago, governing well is the best revenge.