In an unexpected legal move, special counsel David Weiss filed a motion in the California federal court overseeing Hunter Biden’s tax case, urging the judge not to dismiss the charges despite President Joe Biden’s pardon announced on Sunday.

President Biden’s pardon covers the period from January 1, 2014, to December 1, 2024. This includes Hunter Biden’s June jury-trial convictions for providing false information about his drug use on a federal firearm purchase form, as well as his September conviction on nine charges related to failing to pay over $1.4 million in taxes from 2016 to 2019.

Without the pardon, Hunter Biden faced a potential prison sentence of up to 17 years for his tax-related offenses.

“The charges in his cases came about only after several of my political opponents in Congress instigated them to attack me and oppose my election,” Biden claimed in a statement accompanying his pardon announcement.

In a Monday court filing in a federal district court in California, Weiss wrote, “There was none and never has been any evidence of vindictive or selective prosecution in this case.”

“The defendant [Hunter Biden] made similar baseless accusations in the United States District Court for the District of Delaware. Those claims were also rejected,” he added.

“In total, eleven different [federal] judges appointed by six different presidents, including his father, considered and rejected the defendant’s claims, including his claims for selective and vindictive prosecution,” Weiss’s filing continued.

New: Special Counsel David Weiss's office opposes Hunter Biden's motion to completely dismiss his indictment based on the pardon.

"The Government does not challenge that the defendant has been the recipient of an act of mercy. But that does not mean the grand jury’s decision to… pic.twitter.com/6gsqzBoC04

— Matt Rice (@matt____rice) December 2, 2024

The special counsel’s office requested that the judge refrain from dismissing the tax charges and instead close the docket with a notation that a pardon had been granted. This would ensure that the case record remains on the record.

“[I]t has been the practice of this court that once an Executive Grant of Clemency has been filed on the docket, the docket is marked closed, the disposition entry is updated to reflect the executive grant of clemency, and no further action is taken by the Court,” Weiss wrote.

He also noted that Hunter Biden has not yet filed the pardon with the court, nor has his office received it.

“If media reports are accurate, the Government does not challenge that the defendant has been the recipient of an act of mercy. But that does not mean the grand jury’s decision to charge him, based on a finding of probable cause, should be wiped away as if it never occurred. It also does not mean that his charges should be wiped away because the defendant falsely claimed that the charges were the result of some improper motive,” Weiss wrote.

He concluded, “No court has agreed with the defendant on these baseless claims, and his request to dismiss the indictment finds no support in the law or the practice of this district.”