'Deeply concerned': Biden considering preemptive pardons for people Trump may target

Throughout the course of his third bid for the White House, President-elect Donald Trump repeatedly promised to use the full powers of the federal government to prosecute his political enemies. Now, President Joe Biden appears to be taking those threats seriously.

According to a Wednesday report by Politico's Jonathan Martin, Biden is now weighing preemptive pardons for several people Trump has directly targeted, including Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) — who won California's U.S. Senate race in November — and former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), who was vice chair of the House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack.

Martin wrote that Biden was "deeply concerned" about the fate of the people Trump has singled out, particularly after the president-elect nominated Kash Patel to be the next potential FBI director. According to the Hill, Patel has referred to Schiff — who led Trump's first impeachment effort — as a "government gangster," and has accused Cheney of being "the main architect of this disinformation campaign."

READ MORE: 'Sinister deep staters': Even right-wing Republicans are on Kash Patel's 'hit list'

"[Cheney] and her band of miscreants suppressed evidence that completely exonerates the Jan. 6 defendants from their ginned-up charge of insurrection," Patel wrote in a May email.

Biden is also reportedly weighing a pardon for Dr. Anthony Fauci, who is the former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Martin didn't name any other potential recipients of a preemptive pardon, but Patel is reportedly eyeing both Democrats and Republicans alike for prosecution, including former Attorney General Bill Barr, former National Security Advisor John Bolton, former Defense Secretary Mark Esper and other former Trump White House staffers who later opposed him publicly, like Sarah Isgur Flores, Alyssa Farah Griffin and Stephanie Grisham.

"If it’s clear by January 19 that [revenge] is his intention, then I would recommend to President Biden that he provide those preemptive pardons to people, because that’s really what our country is going to need next year," Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) told WGBH.

Journalist Eleanor Clift recently called on Biden to issue preemptive pardons for Cheney and Schiff, along with former Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.), who also publicly opposed Trump during the 2024 election cycle. Former Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley and former White House Chief of Staff John Kelly — who both called Trump a "fascist" — have also been recommended for pardons.

READ MORE: 'We're going to come after the people in the media': Trump ally calls for prosecuting journalists

Click here to read Martin's full article for Politico in full.