December 11, 2024
President Joe Biden has pardoned his son Hunter, who was convicted on felony gun and tax charges earlier this year.
Half of adults disapprove of his decision, while 22% approve. About a quarter of the public neither approve nor disapprove of the pardon (18%) or don’t know enough about the issue to say one way or the other (8%).
Democrats are more likely than both independents or Republicans to approve of Biden’s pardon. However, only 38% of Democrats approve and 27% disapprove. The vast majority of Republicans, 80%, disapprove.
This pardon comes at the end Biden’s presidency, but its unpopularity does not seem to have affected the public’s overall view of how Biden is handling his job. About 4 in 10 adults approve of Biden’s job performance and about 6 in 10 disapprove, similar to his job ratings in AP-NORC polls for the past three years.
Democrats continue to be more likely than both independents and Republicans to approve of how Biden is handling his job as president. And Republicans and independents remain strongly negative.
Adults ages 45 and older are more likely than younger adults to approve of Biden’s job performance. Two thirds of younger adults disapprove, compared with about half of older adults.
The nationwide poll was conducted December 5-9, 2024 using the AmeriSpeak® Panel, the probability-based panel of NORC at the University of Chicago. Online and telephone interviews using landlines and cell phones were conducted with 1,251 adults. The overall margin of sampling error is +/- 3.7 percentage points.
- Suggested Citation: AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. (December 2024). https://apnorc.org/projects/adults-are-twice-as-likely-to-disapprove-than-approve-of-president-bidens-decision-to-pardon-his-son-hunter/
