Biden White House officials consider preemptive pardons for Anthony Fauci, Adam Schiff and Liz Cheney

Some White House officials are considering submitting three names to President Joe Biden to be granted preemptive pardons before the arrival of President-elect Donald Trump to the White House.

According to Politico, several senior Biden administration officials, including White House counsel Ed Siskel and Chief of Staff Jeff Zients, have argued that Dr. Anthony Fauci, Senator-elect Adam Schiff and Rep. Liz Cheney need preemptive pardons to "protect" them from any eventual legal action by the Justice Department in 2025, when Trump assumes the presidency.

The outlet reports that Biden's allies are worried that Trump will use the DOJ to go after his political enemies, even though the Republican front-runner has insisted in recent weeks that he is ready to be a president who brings Americans together again by overcoming the extreme polarization of recent years.

In recent years Fauci, Schiff and Cheney have been questioned by Republicans and Trump himself.

Dozens of Republican lawmakers and watchdog groups have accused Dr. Fauci, who was director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) from 1984 to 2022, of lying to Congress about the origins of COVID-19 and using a private email account to conduct government business.

Cheney, a former Republican representative and a regular critic of the president-elect, served a determining role in the House investigation into Trump's role in the January 6 events on Capitol Hill.

Meanwhile, Democratic Rep. Schiff, elected to the U.S. Senate last month, has been harshly criticized for consistently spreading unsubstantiated allegations about the Trump campaign's disproven collusion with Russia during the 2016 presidential election.

However, despite senior White House officials discussing pardons, Democratic President Joe Biden has yet to participate in the deliberations, Politico reported.

Democratic officials fear that granting blanket pardons to people who have not been charged with a crime could be seen as a lack of decorum by the American public, which has already reacted negatively to President Biden's sweeping and unexpected pardon of his son, Hunter.

Likewise, senior Biden administration officials are also aware that those who receive preemptive pardons may reject them.