The Jewish Week website reports today (October 2, 2011) that President Obama was considering clemency for convicted anti-American spy Jonathan Pollard, until Vice President Joseph Biden convinced him not to let Pollard out of prison.
"President Obama was considering clemency, but I told him, 'Over my dead body are we going to let him out before his time,'" Biden said during a recent meeting with rabbis in Boca Raton, Florida. Biden added, "If it were up to me, he would stay in jail for life."
Pollard -- whose job allowed him to have access to classified top secret information -- was sentenced to life in prison in 1987 for spying on the United States for Israel. He is scheduled for mandatory parole in November 2015.
Obama is relying strongly on Biden for help in his re-election campaign with Jewish-American voters. In contrast to Obama, Biden -- through his years of foreign relations work in the U.S. Senate -- has built lifelong ties with many Israeli politicians.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment