After greater than a half-century in politics, no topic could also be extra personally painful nor politically problematic for President Biden than his troubled son, Hunter. He is by numerous accounts a gaping wound in his coronary heart and probably the most delicate comfortable spot in his marketing campaign armor.

On the one hand, Hunter Biden’s agreement on Tuesday to plead guilty to 2 misdemeanor tax crimes capped a five-year investigation with out allegations of wrongdoing by the president or, presumably, jail time for his youngest son. But however, it put Hunter as soon as once more within the cross-hairs of Mr. Biden’s adversaries who immediately complained that the wayward son bought off too simple.

The saga of the 53-year-old presidential progeny who has struggled with a crack cocaine addiction has develop into a fixation of the political proper, which sees him, or at the least has solid him, as a strolling, speaking exemplar of the pay-to-play tradition of the Washington swamp who profited off proximity to energy. The phrase “Hunter Biden’s laptop” has taken on totemic that means for opponents of the president, even when they can not describe what was truly discovered on the pc that turned up at a restore store in 2020.

The timing of the youthful Mr. Biden’s plea settlement, coming practically two weeks after the indictment of former President Donald J. Trump on 37 felony counts of jeopardizing nationwide safety and obstructing justice, invariably generated comparisons between two vastly completely different instances. The president’s allies pointed to the plea deal as proof that Mr. Biden was enjoying it straight by letting a prosecutor first appointed by Mr. Trump determine deal with his son’s misconduct, whereas the previous president and his backers characterised it as proof of selective justice.

“The corrupt Biden DOJ just cleared up hundreds of years of criminal liability by giving Hunter Biden a mere ‘traffic ticket,’” Mr. Trump wrote on his social media platform. “Slap on the wrist” turned the phrase of selection for Republicans like Representatives James R. Comer of Kentucky and Elise Stefanik of New York.

David Brock, a Democratic operative, mentioned the end result of the prosecution refuted the various allegations hurled on the president and his son because the Trump administration. “Hunter will not be charged with any of the unfounded and outlandish issues Republicans and right-wing media have used to smear him with for years,” Mr. Brock mentioned.

It is a debate Mr. Biden would simply as quickly not interact in and he stayed largely quiet within the hours after news of the plea settlement broke, authorizing a White House spokesman to say solely that he and the primary woman “love their son and support him as he continues to rebuild his life.”

Asked by reporters touring with him in California whether or not he had spoken with Hunter on Tuesday, the president mentioned merely, “I’m very proud of my son.”

Mr. Biden understands that the plea deal is not going to be the top of the matter as House Republicans aggressively conduct their very own inquiries and publicize extra sensational accusations that, even with out affirmation, have develop into a staple of conservative media.

But after months of ready in frustration for the case to be resolved, Mr. Biden was relieved to have the plea settlement settled, hoping it will raise an infinite burden from his son’s shoulders with out triggering a relapse of his habit issues, in accordance with folks near him. Mr. Biden has remained publicly silent not out of concern of political blowback, the folks mentioned, however out of concern of inflicting extra torment on his son.

“I don’t know of any parent who wants to see their son or family’s personal or legal struggle play out so publicly for all the world to see,” mentioned Michael LaRosa, a former spokesman for Jill Biden. “In the three years I worked for them on the campaign and in the White House, they never became immune to the personal assault on their family. Every smear, attack, conspiracy and lie about their son is painful and never gets old.”

Troubled and troublesome relations have been a perennial White House headache for a lot of presidents. In trendy instances, the cruel highlight of media scrutiny has centered on Donald Nixon’s monetary dealings with Howard Hughes, Billy Carter’s work as an agent for Libya, Neil Bush’s service on the board of a failed financial savings and mortgage, Roger Clinton’s drug convictions and naturally the assorted monetary and safety clearance points involving Mr. Trump’s youngsters and son-in-law.

For probably the most half, the presidents sought to stay faraway from their relations’ issues, though Bill Clinton did give his half brother a pardon simply earlier than leaving workplace. How a lot any of these points damage the presidents politically could also be up for debate, however at house they have been typically a supply of anguish — both irritation at a beloved one for inflicting issues or guilt at placing a goal on the again of members of the family, or each.

Hunter Biden has develop into in some methods a extra excessive instance of the phenomenon in an period when any restraint a couple of president’s household which may have existed prior to now has lengthy since vanished. His work in Ukraine helped result in Mr. Trump’s first impeachment, his laptop computer led to allegations that Twitter coated up on his behalf, his overseas monetary ties have prompted sprawling congressional investigations and his turbulent private life has produced a lot tabloid fodder.

Many Americans have been persuaded that the president’s son has been as much as one thing shady past the tax and gun expenses at difficulty on Tuesday. A Harris Poll conducted last month for Harvard’s Center for American Political Studies discovered that 63 % of Americans assume Hunter Biden was concerned in “illegal influence peddling,” and 53 % mentioned his father was one way or the other concerned whereas vp.

Even a number of the president’s Democratic allies have privately mentioned there have been reliable questions on Hunter Biden’s enterprise dealings in Ukraine and China that appeared to commerce on his title. Even as they emphasised that there was no proof that his father abused his energy in workplace in consequence, they lamented that Mr. Biden had not carried out extra to rein in his son’s profitable actions.

Even so, none of these produced expenses in Tuesday’s deal, and the truth that it was brokered by David C. Weiss, the U.S. lawyer who was first appointed by Mr. Trump’s lawyer common to research and was allowed to remain on the case by Mr. Biden’s Justice Department, offered a helpful rejoinder to allegations of favoritism. Mr. Weiss advised Congress that he was granted “ultimate authority over this matter.”

Democratic strategists doubted the difficulty would resonate with swing voters regardless. “The Republicans have been all in on and constantly beating the Hunter Biden drum and while it certainly riles up their base, there isn’t much evidence that the average voter feels impacted by this issue,” mentioned Cornell Belcher, a Democratic pollster who labored for President Barack Obama.

For the president, although, it’s far more private. His relationship together with his son was cast within the 1972 automotive accident that killed Mr. Biden’s first spouse and toddler daughter and hospitalized Hunter and his older brother, Beau.

While Beau grew as much as develop into a profitable politician who his father imagined may develop into president himself someday, Hunter struggled with alcohol, medicine and private points. After Beau died of brain cancer in 2015, a distraught Hunter spiraled into repeated bouts with crack cocaine that finally destroyed his marriage.

As he wrote in “Beautiful Things,” his 2021 memoir, he would descend into weekslong drug binges, smoking crack as typically as each quarter-hour and fascinating in erratic and even reckless conduct, together with inviting his avenue supplier to reside with him and conducting an extramarital affair with Beau’s widow, Hallie Biden. He described a lifetime of “buying crack in the middle of the night behind a gas station in Nashville, Tenn., or craving the tiny liquor bottles in your hotel minibar while sitting in a palace in Amman with the king of Jordan.”

At one level when he disappeared for practically a month, he opened his door to seek out his father, then the vp, trailed by Secret Service brokers. “You need help,” his father mentioned. As Hunter Biden wrote, “He wouldn’t leave until I agreed to do something.” On one other event the elder Mr. Biden participated in a household intervention, ambushing Hunter to push him into therapy. When Hunter stormed out in anger, his father chased him down the driveway, grabbed him and cried.

Hunter Biden has since remarried, paid the tax debt that led to Tuesday’s expenses and mentioned he had turned his life round. Friends of the household mentioned he had demonstrated fortitude.

“Hunter has had the character to recover from his addiction and partisan political attacks to sign this settlement and begin the rest of his life,” mentioned former Senator Ted Kaufman, Democrat of Delaware and a longtime adviser to Mr. Biden.

Still, Hunter Biden faces a civil trial in Arkansas subsequent month in a dispute over baby assist funds to a girl who in 2018 bore a daughter that he denied was his till DNA proved his paternity — a case that Republicans made positive to spotlight on Tuesday.

The youthful Mr. Biden solely sometimes reveals up at public White House occasions, understanding that at any time when he does it should develop into a difficulty. He attended a state dinner on the White House in December and traveled together with his father to Ireland in April.

But no matter whether or not he’s there in particular person, Hunter Biden will proceed to be a presence in his father’s presidency, welcome or not, particularly as subsequent yr’s election attracts nearer.