The president just prior to Trump pardoned his own son for crimes, and pre-emptively pardoned various other family members and political allies for any possible crimes before they could be prosecuted. Again, this is not new, this is ongoing open-air corruption, and Trump's escalation is the result of everyone being OK with it before now.
The son committed a crime and it could be argued it would have been a net benefit for democracy for him to accept the sentence.
It's also true his son was prosecuted politically, because few if any people go to jail for 4473 falsification.
It's also true that this is new and unprecedented.