Pennsylvania Officials of outgoing President Joe Biden's birthplace are demanding that his name be removed from a prominent local landmark following his controversial decision to pardon a federal judge involved in a cash-for-kids program that jailed thousands of juveniles in the state. The move has sparked outrage in Scranton, where Biden has deep ties, with many arguing that the pardon tarnishes the president's legacy. The expressway, which honors Biden's contributions to the city and the country, now faces renewed scrutiny as local leaders demand that his name be stripped from the site in response to the controversial pardon.
The newly elected Pennsylvania Republican State Rep. Brenda Pugh is calling on city officials to remove Biden’s name from expressways labeled in his honor after he pardoned former Luzerne County Judge Michael Conahan after he was convicted of profiting off sentencing juveniles for-profit prisons.
She called the pardon a disgrace and a slap in the face.
“Conahan’s conduct is forever a blight on Pennsylvania and is a slap in the face to the victims and their families who deserve justice to be served for his atrocious crimes,” Pugh wrote.
“His clemency places complicity and a stamp of approval on his behavior. Children are among the most vulnerable Pennsylvanians. This decision is nothing short of a travesty, and his clemency is a miscarriage of justice.”
She criticized the pardon and said that some of the children were jailed for minor offenses such as jaywalking. Some of the children affected by Conahan’s actions, she noted, are now adults suffering in their own “mental” prisons because of Conahan’s “deeds of self-fulfillment.”
As a result of Conahan’s conviction, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court threw out nearly 4,000 juvenile cases.
“Crimes against children are everlasting, and there is no escape from the irreparable damage these predators caused by their actions,” she continued.
Even the state’s Democrat Gov. Josh Shapiro (PA) called Biden’s decision to pardon the former judge a travesty.
“I’ll offer these thoughts as an outsider, not privy to all the information he looked at, but I do feel strongly that President Biden got it absolutely wrong and created a lot of pain here in northeastern Pennsylvania,” Shapiro said last week.
“Some children took their lives because of this. Families were torn apart. There was all kinds of mental health issues and anguish that came as a result of these corrupt judges deciding they wanted to make a buck off a kid’s back.”
In 2021, the mayor and city council unanimously voted to rename the three-quarter-mile spur of the Central Scranton Expressway off Interstate 81 and its continuation through downtown, renaming it the "President Biden Expressway" and "Biden Avenue."