This was surprising to see.
Former President Joe Biden reportedly considered making a stunning move involving Donald Trump while Trump was facing multiple criminal cases and preparing another run for the White House.
According to Republican Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, Biden privately acknowledged in 2023 that he had considered the possibility of pardoning Trump — and had even discussed the idea with then-first lady Jill Biden.
The remarkable claim is detailed in Cox’s new book, Off Ramp: How to Be a Peacemaker in an Age of Contempt, and offers Americans a new glimpse behind the scenes of one of the most bitter political rivalries in modern history.
Had Biden actually pardoned Trump, the decision could have dramatically altered the political and legal battles that dominated Washington heading into the 2024 presidential election.
But the pardon never happened.
Republican Governor Asked Biden To Pardon Trump
The conversation reportedly took place on August 9, 2023, while Biden was visiting Salt Lake City.
Cox says he was riding with the president in the presidential limousine when he decided to make an extraordinary suggestion.
The Republican governor urged Biden to consider pardoning Trump.
At the time, Trump was the Republican presidential frontrunner and facing criminal charges in multiple jurisdictions. His legal troubles had already become one of the biggest political stories in America.
For many Trump supporters, the prosecutions also raised serious concerns about the growing collision between presidential politics and the criminal justice system.
Cox believed a pardon could potentially lower the political temperature and prevent the country from moving further down a path of partisan retaliation.
What happened next apparently surprised him.
Biden Had Already Thought About It
According to Cox, Biden did not simply reject the proposal.
Instead, Biden allegedly revealed that he had already been thinking about the possibility.
Cox says Biden told him that he had considered a Trump pardon for some time and had recently discussed the subject at length with Jill Biden.
That detail makes the revelation particularly striking.
This was apparently not an idea Biden was hearing for the first time from a Republican governor. According to Cox’s account, the possibility had already become a subject of private discussion inside the Biden family.
Cox came away from the conversation believing Biden might genuinely consider the proposal.
But Biden ultimately never pardoned Trump.
Why Would Biden Have Pardoned Trump?
Cox’s reasoning was centered on national unity rather than an endorsement of Trump.
The Utah governor had long expressed concerns about America’s increasingly hostile political environment and believed prosecuting a former president could deepen the country’s divisions.
A presidential pardon, in his view, offered a possible way to stop the escalating cycle.
There was also historical precedent for a president using the pardon power in an attempt to help the country move beyond a major political crisis.
President Gerald Ford famously pardoned former President Richard Nixon in 1974 following the Watergate scandal.
Ford’s decision was enormously controversial at the time, but he maintained that continuing the battle over Nixon would prevent the country from moving forward.
A Biden pardon of Trump would have been different in important ways, but the political implications could have been just as enormous.
There Was One Major Limitation
Even if Biden had decided to pardon Trump, his presidential authority would not have erased every legal problem Trump faced.
A president’s pardon authority applies to federal offenses.
That means Biden could not simply have wiped away state-level cases using his presidential pardon power.
Still, a pardon covering Trump’s potential federal offenses would have represented one of the most consequential uses of presidential clemency in generations.
It also would have created an extraordinary political moment: a Democratic president granting clemency to the Republican rival seeking to remove him from the White House.
Biden And Trump Were Headed Toward Another Showdown
The timing makes Cox’s revelation even more significant.
In 2023, Trump was mounting his political comeback while Biden was preparing to seek another term.
The country appeared headed toward a rematch between the two men.
Trump repeatedly accused Biden and Democrats of weaponizing the justice system against him, while Biden and his allies portrayed Trump as a threat to American democracy.
Against that backdrop, a pardon would have been a political earthquake.
Biden’s supporters could have viewed such a decision as letting Trump escape accountability.
Trump supporters, on the other hand, might have viewed it as an acknowledgment that continuing the prosecutions was damaging the country.
Either way, America would have entered the 2024 election under dramatically different circumstances.
Cox Later Made A Similar Appeal To Trump
Cox’s effort to convince Biden to take a less confrontational approach was not his only attempt to cool America’s political tensions.
After the July 2024 assassination attempt against Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, Cox reached out to Trump as well.
The shooting became one of the defining moments of the 2024 campaign.
Following the attack, Cox publicly backed Trump and encouraged him to use the moment to bring Americans together.
The Utah governor believed Trump had been given a rare opportunity to emphasize national unity following an act of shocking political violence.
Cox hoped the president would adopt a less combative approach toward his opponents.
According to the governor, that did not happen in the way he had envisioned.
Trump eventually returned to the aggressive political style that helped make him one of the most influential — and polarizing — political figures in modern American history.
Cox Says Neither President Took The Path He Wanted
The two episodes reveal the larger theme behind Cox’s book.
He wanted Biden to show mercy toward Trump.
Later, he wanted Trump to emphasize unity rather than retaliation.
In Cox’s telling, neither president ultimately followed the course he had hoped to see.
His account also provides a rare look at a political possibility that Americans knew virtually nothing about at the time.
Biden never publicly announced plans to pardon Trump, and there is no indication from Cox’s account that a formal pardon process was initiated.
That distinction matters.
The revelation is that Biden allegedly considered pardoning Trump and privately discussed the possibility — not that Biden actually issued or formally approved such a pardon.
The Pardon That Never Happened
Years later, the story raises an intriguing question about how differently American politics might have unfolded.
What if Biden had pardoned Trump?
Would it have lowered political tensions and allowed the country to move forward?
Would it have strengthened Trump politically by allowing him to campaign without some of the federal legal battles hanging over him?
Or would Biden have faced a revolt from Democrats who wanted Trump held accountable?
Americans will never know.
What they now have, according to Cox, is a remarkable behind-the-scenes account showing that one of the most consequential presidential pardons in modern American history was at least discussed.
Biden ultimately decided against it.
Trump continued his political comeback, won his way back to the White House, and the rivalry between the two men became another extraordinary chapter in American political history.
For voters who spent years watching Biden and Trump battle over the future of the country, Cox’s revelation offers a fascinating look at a road that was considered — but never taken.