President Joe Biden has proudly referenced his roots in Scranton, Pennsylvania, on countless occasions.
But after he pardoned a judge involved in a cash-for-kids program that jailed thousands of juveniles in northeastern Pennsylvania, the Electric City is no longer feeling that spark of love.
The newly elected Pennsylvania Republican State Rep. Brenda Pugh called on officials in Scranton to remove Biden’s name from expressways labeled in his honor after he pardoned former Luzerne County Judge Michael Conahan.
That now-disgraced official was convicted after taking kickbacks in exchange for sending juveniles to jail for committing minor crimes, or committing no crime whatsoever, according to PAHomepage.
Pugh said the fact that Biden pardoned Conahan was a disgrace that merits renaming the “President Joe Biden Expressway,” originally named for the commander-in-chief by the Scranton City Council in 2021.
“Conahan’s conduct is forever a blight on Pennsylvania and is a slap in the face to the victims and their families who deserve justice to be served for his atrocious crimes,” Pugh wrote, per PAHomepage.
“His clemency places complicity and a stamp of approval on his behavior,” she continued. “Children are among the most vulnerable Pennsylvanians. This decision is nothing short of a travesty and his clemency is a miscarriage of justice.”
Pugh is far from the only Pennsylvania official to express concern over the presidential pardon.
Even Pennsylvania Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro cringed at the pardon of the corrupt official.
“I’ll offer these thoughts as an outsider, not privy to all the information he looked at, but I do feel strongly that President Biden got it absolutely wrong and created a lot of pain here in northeastern Pennsylvania,” Shapiro said last week, per the Pennsylvania Capital-Star.
“Some children took their lives because of this. Families were torn apart,” Shapiro said of the original scandal. “There was all kinds of mental health issues and anguish that came as a result of these corrupt judges deciding they wanted to make a buck off a kid’s back.”
It is indeed rather difficult to see why Biden deserves to have any highways named in his honor.
This cash-for-kids scheme was clearly the last straw for at least some in Scranton.
But there are plenty of reasons to remove his name from that highway and other infrastructure in the city named for him.
Even beyond his mismanagement of the economy, his overseeing of several new wars around the globe, and his clear mental decline covered up by staffers over the past four years, Biden and his family are themselves likely corrupt, as their foreign business dealings in places like Ukraine and China would indicate.
Our outgoing president is no fan of justice.
Highways should simply not be named for those who have problems staying on the straight and narrow.
Given the sheer number of pardons and commutations Biden made — and his obvious cognition problems — it’s quite obvious that he didn’t know what he was signing. (So who drew up that list?) –TPR
