Tag Archive for: political corruption

Joe Biden Pardoned Hunter Biden to ‘Protect the Family Business’: Congressman

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After repeatedly insisting he would never do so, President Joe Biden has pardoned his son, Hunter Biden, for any and all crimes he committed over the last decade and disdained his son’s prosecution as “a miscarriage of justice.” The president reversed course “to protect the family business” of influence-peddling and shaking down foreign leaders that netted the Biden family at least $27 million, said some of the president’s most thorough investigators.

Joe Biden announced he had offered Robert Hunter Biden “a full and unconditional pardon” on Sunday, December 1. The pardon covers “those offenses against the United States which he has committed or may have committed or taken part in during the period from January 1, 2014 through December 1, 2024, including but not limited to all offenses charged or prosecuted (including any that have resulted in convictions) by Special Counsel David C. Weiss.”

Hunter Biden entered a guilty plea to nine federal tax charges — three felonies and six misdemeanors — related to $1.4 million in unpaid taxes on $7 million in income. The first son had also been convicted of three felony charges for lying on a federal application to purchase a handgun, when he falsely attested that he was not drug-dependent. In all, Hunter Biden faced up to 42 years in prison, although he likely would have served 52 months.

But the pardon extends far beyond the tax and gun charges, covering any crime Hunter Biden committed over the last decade, beginning from the time Hunter began his role as a conduit of payments from foreign leaders to the Biden family — an arrangement critics say sold access to the Obama-Biden White House.

But Joe Biden implied that his Republican political opponents had engineered the criminal charges in an attempt to “break” Hunter and drive him out of his sobriety. “For my entire career I have followed a simple principle: just tell the American people the truth,” said the president in a statement accompanying the pardon.

“No reasonable person who looks at the facts of Hunter’s cases can reach any other conclusion than Hunter was singled out only because he is my son – and that is wrong,” Biden contended. “[R]aw politics has infected this process and it led to a miscarriage of justice.”

The family seemingly telegraphed the pardon in an Instagram post which Joe Biden’s daughter, Ashley, uploaded over the Thanksgiving holiday. “They tried to break us … but never will/can. Just made us even stronger, closer, and even more grateful for one another,” wrote the first daughter. Joe Biden echoed his daughter’s words in his statement, writing: “There has been an effort to break Hunter — who has been five and a half years sober, even in the face of unrelenting attacks and selective prosecution. In trying to break Hunter, they’ve tried to break me — and there’s no reason to believe it will stop here. Enough is enough.”

Joe Biden Repeatedly Promised Not to Pardon His Son

The pardon violates numerous promises from Joe Biden and his spokespeople that the president would not pardon his son of any wrongdoing. During Biden’s June 6 visit to commemorate D-Day in Normandy, an ABC News reporter asked him, “Will you accept the jury’s outcome, their verdict, no matter what it is?”

“Yes,” replied Biden weakly.

“And have you ruled out a pardon for your son?”

“Yes,” Biden repeated.

White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre stated at least five times over the last year that Biden would not pardon Hunter: last December 13, and this year on August 14, September 5, November 7, and recently as November 12. She also categorically ruled out the possibility that Biden would commute his son’s prison sentence.

“No one is actually surprised by the Hunter pardon. Biden’s political career was defined by abuse of power for personal gain. This was the most predictable thing ever,” said Joseph Backholm, senior fellow for Biblical Worldview and Strategic Engagement at Family Research Council. “We always knew it was a yes,” agreed Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.).

In fact, President-elect Donald J. Trump predicted the pardon. Fox News reporter Bill Melugin asked then-candidate Trump in October if, “in the name of unity,” he would consider pardoning Hunter Biden. “I’ll bet you the father probably pardons him. We’ll see what happens. But he’s a bad boy, no question about it,” said Trump. He went on to say he did not “want to hurt anybody” by prosecuting his political enemies, even if they are guilty — adding that ultimately, he declined to investigate Hillary Clinton for similar allegations that she funneled foreign bribes through the Clinton foundations.

“Biden pardoned his son because he knows Trump would’ve,” surmised detransitioner Chloe Cole.

But at least one veteran Republican lawmaker seemed taken aback at the news. “I’m shocked [President] Biden pardoned his son Hunter,” because he said “many times he wouldn’t,” and “I believed him,” said Senator Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa). “Shame on me.”

The announcement came late on the Sunday evening of a holiday weekend — a move usually taken to minimize its news impact. Biden explained the statement came out during a holiday weekend, because “once I made this decision this weekend, there was no sense in delaying it further.”

But critical reaction from Republicans, and at least one Democrat, rained in.

‘Such a Miscarriage of Justice’

“Such an abuse and miscarriage of justice!” said President-elect Donald Trump on Truth Social.

Many harangued Biden’s social media post of May 31: “No one is above the law.”

“Unless it’s your son,” retorted Mary Vought, vice president of Strategic Communications at the Heritage Foundation.

The pardon “does complete the ark of corruption of the Biden family, doesn’t it?” asked Tom Fitton, president of Judicial Watch, on Fox Business Monday morning. “This is a scam and a scheme, and he gussies it up in issues of family and addiction.”

Others noted the pardon weakened other aspects of the Democratic Party’s agenda. “The next time Democrats talk about increasing background checks on gun purchases please note their silence on this,” instructed former Trump White House spokesman Sean Spicer.

But the most damning critiques said President Joe Biden pardoned Hunter as a means of indirectly pardoning himself for receiving bribes from overseas, which he funneled through his son and brother, James.

Joe Biden pardoned Hunter “to protect the family business,” said House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith (R-Mo.) in a statement emailed to The Washington Stand on Sunday night.

“Today’s pardon is just the latest in a string of efforts by the Biden administration to cover up and dismiss the years of criminal activity committed by the Biden family,” he said, noting that “evidence has shown President Biden was not only aware but clearly complicit” in his son’s criminal activity.” Thankfully, this decision cannot and will not undermine or cover up the mountain of evidence … that has shown the level of corruption committed in a blatant attempt to trade on the name and power of political office to enrich the Biden family.”

Other congressional investigators echoed those sentiments. “Democrats said there was nothing to our impeachment inquiry. If that’s the case, why did Joe Biden just issue Hunter Biden a pardon for the very things we were inquiring about?” asked Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. Last August, Rep. Greg Steube (R-Fla.) filed four articles of impeachment against Biden, one of which accuses the president of selling access to the U.S. government through Hunter Biden and his brother, Jim Biden.

10% for ‘the Big Guy’

Three House committees — the House Oversight Committee, Judiciary Committee, and Ways and Means Committee — released a 291-page impeachment inquiry report on August 19, detailing how the Biden family received at least $27 million from foreign funding over the years, as well as receiving $8 million in loans from Democratic funders. “President Joe Biden conspired to commit influence peddling and grift,” the report concluded. “The totality of the corrupt conduct uncovered by the committees is egregious.”

The most explosive email noted that Hunter Biden would save 10% of his Ukrainian business deals for “the big guy,” a reference business associates confirmed identifies Joe Biden.

Congressional reports have traced millions of dollars in transfers from foreign governments to the Biden family, including:

  • $10 million from Burisma Holdings Ltd. Hunter Biden received $83,333 a month as a board member of Burisma, the Ukrainian energy company, despite having no knowledge of Ukraine or energy, at a time when his father served as vice president and Burisma faced a criminal probe from Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin. According to the FD-1023 form obtained by Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa, CEO and president of Burisma, Mykola Zlochevsky, said he paid $10 million “protection” money. A federal informant told the FBI in June 2020 that Zlochevsky told donors nothing would come of an investigation by a Ukrainian prosecutor named Viktor Shokin, saying, “Don’t worry, Hunter will take care of all of those issues through his dad.” In December 2016, Joe Biden would confront then-President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko, leveraging $1 billion in U.S. aid to demand — and receive — Shokin’s ouster.
  • $1 million from Burisma Holdings’ corporate secretary Vadym Pozharsky to Hunter Biden, agreed to in spring 2014.
  • $3.5 million in February 2014 from Russian oligarch Yelena Baturina to the shell company Rosemont Seneca Thornton. Of that, $2.5 million went to the Bidens and $1 million went to Biden associate Devon Archer. The Obama-Biden administration did not sanction Baturina, even as it cracked down on others in Vladimir Putin’s orbit.
  • $3.1 million from Romanian real estate tycoon Gabriel Popoviciu in 2015. Popoviciu hired Hunter Biden to cause the Obama-Biden administration to “investigate the Romanian criminal investigation into Gabriel Popoviciu and thereby cause an end to the investigation of Gabriel Popoviciu in Romania,” according to court filings from Special Counsel David C. Weiss. Hunter Biden met with Romania’s ambassador to the United States one day after Popoviciu wired $179,836.86 to a business account controlled by Robinson Walker, LLC. In all, the Romanian oligarch sent the firm $3.1 million, split between Hunter Biden and two associates, Rob Walker and James Gilliar. Hunter Biden should have registered as a foreign lobbyist under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) but did not, because he was “concerned that lobbying work might cause political ramifications for the defendant’s father,” then-Vice President Joe Biden, who handled the administration’s Eastern European portfolio at the time.
  • Several million from China in two deals, the largest of which is from the China Energy Fund Committee (CEFC). That deal produced the infamous text message of Hunter Biden claiming Joe Biden was seated next to him as he demanded a CEFC official wire him money.
  • $142,300 — “the exact price of Biden’s sportscar” — from Kenes Rakishev of Kazakhstan, a close associate of that nation’s prime minister, in April 2014. Hunter purchased a hybrid vehicle known as a Fisker Karma the day after the deposit.

Although President Joe Biden has continuously insisted, “I did not interact with their business partners,” Hunter Biden testified to two House committees in March that then-Vice President Joe Biden met with Burisma Corporate Secretary Vadym Pozharsky, Chinese business figure Jonathan Li, Russian oligarch Yelena Baturina, and Kazakhstan oligarch Kenes Rakishev between 2013 and 2015. Last August, the House Oversight Committee released a list of 16 times Biden lied about his family’s business.

Biden also assisted his son’s business endeavors as vice president, Republicans charge. Joe Biden improperly used Air Force Two and Marine Two to transport Hunter Biden to 15 countries, where he often struck business deals that financially benefited the Biden family. Vice President Biden also used pseudonymous email addresses — Robert.L.Peters@pci.gov, robinware456@gmail.com, and JRBWare@gmail.com — to include his son on official business, records show. One involved a meeting with then-Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, copied to Hunter Biden’s email address at Rosemont Seneca Partners (hbiden@rosemontseneca.com), one of at least 20 shell companies the Bidens established.

At least nine members of the Biden family have benefited from Hunter’s business deals, according to House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.):

  • Hunter Biden;
  • James and Sara Biden, the president’s brother and sister-in-law;
  • Hunter’s ex-wife, Kathleen Buhle;
  • His current wife, Melissa Cohen;
  • Hunter’s ex-girlfriend, Hallie Biden, who is his brother, Beau Biden’s widow; and
  • Three unnamed children or grandchildren of Joe or James Biden.

The federal government had investigated Hunter Biden for years due, in part, to the contents of his laptop, which Democrats derided as “Russian disinformation.” U.S. Attorney David C. Weiss of Delaware allowed the statute of limitations to run out on numerous charges. The Biden administration announced last August it had appointed Weiss as special counsel to investigate the Hunter Biden scandal. Attorney General Merrick Garland claimed Weiss requested his appointment to the role which, according to the Code of Federal Regulations (28 CFR § 600.3), is supposed to be “selected from outside the United States [g]overnment.”

Sweetheart Plea Deal Scuttled

In his pardon statement, President Joe Biden lamented that “a carefully negotiated plea deal, agreed to by the Department of Justice, unraveled in the court room — with a number of my political opponents in Congress taking credit for bringing political pressure on the process. Had the plea deal held, it would have been a fair, reasonable resolution of Hunter’s cases.” However, the plea bargain — which also shielded Hunter Biden from prosecution on any future charges — fell apart last July when federal district Judge Maryellen Noreika questioned its constitutionality.

“No amount of lies or spin can hide the simple truth that the Justice Department nearly let the President’s son off the hook for multiple felonies,” said IRS whistleblowers Supervisory Special Agent Gary Shapley and Special Agent Joe Ziegler in a statement Sunday night. “Anyone reading the President’s excuses now should remember that Hunter Biden admitted to his tax crimes in federal court, that Hunter Biden’s attorneys have targeted us for our lawful whistleblower disclosures, and that we are suing one of those attorneys for smearing us with false accusations.”

The two took pride that, thanks to their work, “President Biden has the power to put his thumb on the scales of justice for his son, but at least he had to do it with a pardon explicitly for all the world to see rather than his political appointees doing it secretly behind the scenes.”

House Republicans picked up the case, which had been dropped by the Biden administration. Reps. Comer, Smith, and Jordan cited Hunter Biden’s false testimony to Congress as they jointly referred him for prosecution by the Justice Department on June 5. As this author reported at The Washington Stand:

“The evidence shows that he lied under oath three times, House Republicans say. They say Hunter lied about a text he sent telling a Chinese official he and his father would use all their power against the company unless they received payment for services rendered. ‘I sent the text to the wrong Zhao,’ said Hunter, claiming he texted a man who had nothing to do with the Chinese energy company and probably had no idea what the texts were about. The committee released WhatsApp records showing Biden contacted only one Zhao, named Raymond Zhao, whom he stayed in touch with for months. Zhao facilitated the release of $5 million from China to the Biden family.

“They also say Hunter Biden fibbed when he claimed a shell company he set up with friend Devon Archer, Rosemont Seneca Bohai, was never ‘under my control nor affiliated with me.’ The committee released a document signed by the president’s son stating, ‘I, Robert Hunter Biden, hereby certify that I am the duly elected, qualified and acting Secretary of Rosemont Seneca Bohai, LLC.’

“Biden also denied trying to help any foreign business associates obtain a U.S. visa. ‘I’d never pick up the phone and call anybody for a visa,’ he said under oath. The committee released an email from Devon Archer stating, ‘Hunter is checking with Miguel Aleman to see if he can provide cover to Kola on the visa.’ The individual in question, ‘Kola,’ is Nikolay Zlochevsky, CEO of Burisma.”

Many of the charges are detailed in a September 2023 episode of the “Outstanding” podcast.

Legacy Media Reaction

The legacy media covered the pardon with maximum sympathy for Biden and predictably calumniated his Republican foes. Politico.com posted, “Republicans pounce on Biden pardoning his son, Hunter.” After pushback, the website changed the headline to “Republicans say Biden is a ‘liar’ after he pardons Hunter, his son.”

Jeff Zeleny — who once asked then-President Barack Obama what aspect of being president “enchanted” him most — called the pardon “poignant” and “a striking … ending to this Thanksgiving holiday.” Zeleny added, “Clearly, there was pressure inside the family. We were told, really, in recent weeks that Dr. Jill Biden, First Lady Jill Biden, was very supportive of the president doing something like this. The president was not sure.”

Alex Thompson of Axios told Semafor.com that the unfolding criminal conspiracy was “a central drama of the Biden administration which doubled as family tragedy and a love story.” Thompson went on to ding “bad-faith conservatives trying to humiliate” Joe Biden.

As far back as June, former CNN reporter John Harwood said that “people who insist Biden will pardon Hunter after specifically ruling it out are telling on themselves,” because “they can’t imagine someone acting on principle and keeping his word.”

But not all critics of the Hunter Biden pardon belonged to the Republican Party. “While as a father I certainly understand President [Biden’s] natural desire to help his son by pardoning him, I am disappointed that he put his family ahead of the country,” said Colorado Governor Jared Polis (D). “This is a bad precedent that could be abused by later Presidents and will sadly tarnish his reputation. When you become President, your role is Pater familias of the nation. Hunter brought the legal trouble he faced on himself, and one can sympathize with his struggles while also acknowledging that no one is above the law, not a President and not a President’s son.”

AUTHOR

Ben Johnson

Ben Johnson is senior reporter and editor at The Washington Stand.

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2024 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Johnson: Dems ‘Pushed the Pendulum Too Far’ with Trump, It’s ‘Backfiring’

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Washington, D.C. has been unusually drama-free with Congress scattered for the Memorial Day break. Of course, New York was more than happy to pick up the slack with its sham trial against former President Donald Trump — a prosecution, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) warned Family Research Council President Tony Perkins, that’s put our entire country at “a crisis point.”

The Republican leader, like so many conservatives, has watched the proceedings with alarm, understanding all too well the political volatility that might result. “I’m hearing a lot of frustration, and I’m hearing dismay,” Johnson said on “This Week on the Hill.” “You know, people are losing faith in our institutions across the board,” he warned, “… not the least of which is our system of justice.” Frankly, the speaker pointed out, this whole charade “is a serious threat to a constitutional republic. … And I think we’re at a crisis point, because people see what is happening here.”

The facts are clear, Johnson insisted. Americans “see that President Trump is quite obviously being targeted because he is the nominee of the Republican Party for president, and he is a threat to them. He’s leading in the polls, as we mentioned earlier; he’s leading in the swing states — almost all of them now against President Biden. And they’re terrified that he’ll be reelected, the radical Left. And so what do they do? They use the justice system to go after him, try to diminish him, try to keep him off the campaign trail, and do real damage to his chances to win back the White House. I don’t think it’s going to work … but I do think it’s doing serious — and hopefully, not permanent — damage to the people’s faith and our system of justice.”

On the flip side, the case has certainly seemed to galvanize Republicans, who sent the former president a resounding message of support with their dollars after the guilty verdict. In a stunning windfall, Trump’s campaign headquarters said it was inundated with contributions after the 45th president was convicted of 34 felonies. The $53 million haul shattered records, nearly matching what the GOP candidate had raised in the last six months of 2023. And according to two of Trump’s advisors, “This momentum is just getting started.”

And that’s exactly what should worry Democrats. “In a funny kind of way,” former Speaker Newt Gingrich argued, this whole conviction may “backfire on the Left and leave them, I think, weaker than they were if they never [had] gone down this road.” He’s right, according to ABC, who found Trump’s favorability actually increased after the verdict. Across a large swath of the country, he pointed out, “I think people just looked up and said, ‘This is now so sick that I have to get involved.’”

Johnson, who’s been in 112 cities since last October, can testify to that. In his conversation with Perkins, he pointed to one of the biggest signs of momentum for Trump, which is the “enthusiasm gap” between conservatives and the Left. “The Republican Party is animated. And the more … the Democrats try to abuse our justice system and engage in lawfare against our nominee, President Trump, the more energy and enthusiasm there is in the Republican base. It actually is [boomeranging] on them pretty fantastically.”

Then, of course, there are all the actual problems from the last three years of Biden’s policies — “the economy, the cost of living, the rising of crime rates, the open border” — each failure digging the hole deeper for this White House. “I mean, every issue hits home to people,” the speaker insisted. “And I think that the Republicans and an increasing number of other demographics that have never been reliably Republican — [the] Hispanic community, African American community, the Jewish community — I think they’re going to come out and vote in droves for the Republican side, and they’re going to return the levers of power in Washington back to our side, because they desperately need and deserve answers to all these great challenges, and we’re going to supply them.”

In the meantime, Johnson is celebrating the news that Republicans have reinforcements in the form of Vince Fong, who’s taking Kevin McCarthy’s seat from California. “He will bring our Republican majority back to 218 votes. So I will double my majority,” he half-joked. “I can’t wait.”

It will certainly be helpful to the GOP, which has its work cut out for itself in the six-month ramp-up to the election. “When we get back after Memorial Day,” Johnson wanted people to know, “we’re going to address this [anti-Israel] International Criminal Court madness that we talked about. Congress will move on our legislation, and then we’ll shift immediately into and concurrently be working on our appropriations cycle. We’re trying to get our 12 separate appropriations bills done. We have a very aggressive schedule now through the end of July to move that through the process. It takes a lot of time, a lot of effort, a lot of work,” he underscored.

But jumping back into the work of the American people will also help Johnson’s party paint a stark contrast to what the Left is focused on: jailing Trump. “I mean, as fed-up as everyone is with virtually everything right now, every metric of public policy having been destroyed by the Biden administration, people are very optimistic that we can turn this around. They really are. And that’s what the latest polling shows.” The only election ad Democrats are running is a “raw abuse of power.”

As far as the speaker is concerned, the president’s party “pushed the pendulum too far. I think it truly is going to be swinging back in the right direction. … I’m telling you,” Johnson emphasized, “something’s happening out there, and it’s going to be very positive for November.”

AUTHOR

Suzanne Bowdey

Suzanne Bowdey serves as editorial director and senior writer at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLE: Alvin Bragg Wants Trump To Stay Under Gag Order Even After Conviction

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2024 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

‘On the Verge of a Banana Republic’: Biden Used Air Force Two, Pseudonyms to Enrich His Family, GOP Says

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As Barack Obama’s vice president, Joe Biden sent more than 5,000 emails under a host of false names and abused federal resources to facilitate his son, Hunter Biden’s foreign influence-peddling businesses, Republicans say. The combination of corruption and federal agencies refusing to make the records public leaves America “on the verge of being a banana republic,” according to one U.S. congressman.

Details broke this week about two scandals threatening to engulf the 46th president as the 2024 election heats up. First, Congress revealed that then-Vice President Biden improperly used Air Force Two and Marine Two to whisk Hunter Biden to 15 countries, where he often struck business deals enriching himself and at least nine members of the Biden family, possibly including “The Big Guy,” Joe Biden. Second, a legal watchdog has sued the National Archives and Record Administration (NARA) for refusing to turn over 5,138 emails that Joe Biden sent using three separate aliases — including “Robert L. Peters,” “Robin Ware,” and “JRB ware” [sic] — while he was vice president.

Video footage captured Hunter Biden accompanying his father on taxpayer-funded travel during the Obama administration, including a 2013 trip to China that cemented Hunter’s business ties to Beijing. “Then-Vice President Joe Biden abused Air Force Two by allowing his son to jet set around the world to sell ‘The Brand’ to enrich the Biden family. This is yet another example of then-Vice President Biden abusing his public office for his family’s financial gain,” said Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), chairman of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee, which is spearheading numerous investigations into presidential corruption. He demanded NARA leader, U.S. Archivist Colleen Shogan, to turn over all travel-related records about the use of the taxpayer-funded aircraft by Hunter Biden (and his business associates Eric Schwerin, Devon Archer, and Jeffrey Cooper) by September 13.

Yet another watchdog accuses NARA of withholding records for years showing that Joe Biden would send emails under false names while vice president, and copy Hunter Biden on information related to Ukraine. The Southeastern Legal Foundation (SLF) sent a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request about Biden’s use of the pseudonymous government email account Robert.L.Peters@pci.gov, as well as two Gmail accounts: robinware456@gmail.com and JRBWare@gmail.com. The Office of Vice President copied several of the emails sent to these accounts to Hunter Biden, including a May 26, 2016, email about a scheduled phone call between then-Vice President Biden and then-Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko. At the time, Hunter received $83,333 a month as a board member of Ukrainian energy company Burisma Holdings. Biden would later admit to threatening to deny Poroshenko $1 billion in loan guarantees unless he fired prosecutor Viktor Shokin, who was investigating Burisma.

Conservatives have already waited years to see these emails. SLF first asked NARA for these emails two years ago, but NARA said it could not produce the emails until this year for technical reasons. This summer, NARA confirmed the president sent thousands of such messages — but that it may deny or heavily redact the materials before making them available.

“We have performed a search of our collection for Vice Presidential records related to your [June 9 FOIA] request and have identified approximately 5,138 email messages, 25 electronic files and 200 pages of potentially responsive records,” said a letter sent via email on June 24 by Stephannie Oriabure, the director of NARA’s archival operations division. However, the emails “must be processed in order to respond to your request,” and the legal watchdogs may not receive a copy of all messages, as some “may not be applicable to your specific topic.” NARA said it placed their “request in our Complex queue,” which will “treat everyone equitably.”

SLF sued NARA to turn over all materials immediately. “After over a year of trying to work with NARA, its continued unreasonable delays have forced SLF to file this lawsuit,” said Braden Boucek, legal director at the Southeastern Legal Foundation.

The delays and stonewalling outraged conservatives. “This administration promised transparency to the American people. Is this their idea of transparency?” asked Jody Hice, a former U.S. congressman from Georgia and senior vice president at Family Research Council, on Tuesday’s episode of “Washington Watch.” The emails show that “when he was vice president, he was doing government business and discussing government business with his son, Hunter Biden, and others. After nearly two years, not a single one of those emails has been released.”

“By all outward appearances, we are on the verge of being a banana republic,” said Rep. Randy Weber (R-Texas) on “Washington Watch.” The Biden family is “making millions and millions of dollars at taxpayers’ expense, and we’ve got federal agencies that won’t release the information.”

“American citizens ought to be able to look at these documents and make a decision about whether the law was violated,” said Weber. “The people of America ought to rise up and say they want the truth.”

Thus far, Democrats have offered only a vague defense of Biden’s character. “I’m extremely confident the American people know fundamentally that Joe Biden is a good and decent man who’s dedicated his life to public service,” said House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.). But 63% of Americans say Hunter Biden was “involved in illegal influence peddling,” and a majority of Americans (53%) believe Joe Biden participated in his crime, according to a Harvard/Harris Poll released in May.

On the campaign trail in 2019, candidate Biden promised to erect “an absolute wall” between himself and his family’s business deals. “I have never discussed, with my son or my brother or with anyone else, anything having to do with their businesses. Period.” He promised to do “the same thing we did in our administration” as vice president.

“Apparently, the ‘absolute wall’ only applied to the specific name ‘Joe Biden,’” wrote libertarian columnist James Bovard in the New York Post.

The House Oversight Committee cited the president’s comments as one of 16 times Biden lied about his family’s business schemes — each one containing video footage of Biden’s statement, which the committee then contrasts with the facts.

“How many other FBI memos exist on potential Biden bribes that we have not heard about?” asked Bovard.

For now, investigators still want to learn the details about these government emails. If federal agencies, which are supposed to be politically neutral, stonewall that effort, Weber thinks they should pay the price.

“I would hope that members of Congress actually use their power to reduce funding on some of these agencies,” said Weber. Then the American people need to “clean house” and “kick out these crazy Democrats who have zero transparency, operate under pseudonyms, claim that they had absolutely nothing to do with their son’s business, and lie with a straight face.”

AUTHOR

Ben Johnson

Ben Johnson is senior reporter and editor at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLES:

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Congressman Introduces Bill to Impeach Joe Biden over Corruption, Obstruction, Fraud, and Drugs

‘This Thing Stinks’: GOP Pans Special Counsel Appointed to Investigate Hunter Biden

RELATED PODCAST: Ep. 27: Scandal, Politics, and The Family Business

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Trump Was Right Again And Again About The Biden Family’s Foreign Business Dealings

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Former President Donald Trump’s assertions during the 2020 presidential campaign about the Biden family’s foreign business dealings have proven to be accurate.

Trump routinely criticized then-Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden about his son’s dealings with Ukrainian, Russian and Chinese associates when he was on the campaign trail, most notably at the presidential debates leading up to the November 2020 election.

WATCH:

“China ate your lunch, Joe. And no wonder your son goes in and, wha—, he takes out billions of dollars. He takes out billions of dollars to manage. He makes millions of dollars. And also, while we’re at it, why is it — just out of curiosity — the mayor of Moscow’s wife gave your son three and a half million dollars,” Trump said to Biden during a September 2020 presidential debate, according to an official transcript from the Commission on Presidential Debates.

“That is not true,” Biden retorted.

“What did he do to deserve it? What did he do with Burisma?” Trump pressed.

“None of that is true,” Biden shot back.

“My son did nothing wrong at Burisma,” Biden said later in the debate.

” I think he did,” Trump retorted.

“He doesn’t want to let me answer, because he knows I have the truth. His position has been totally thoroughly discredited,” Biden claimed.

“By who?” Trump asked.

“By everybody. Well, by the media, by our allies,” Biden answered.

Trump and Biden continued clashing at the September debate over the Biden family’s business dealings despite moderator Chris Wallace’s efforts to shift the conversation.

“And he threatened Ukraine —,” Trump said.

“Sir,” Wallace interrupted.

” — with a billion dollars,” Trump said.

“That is absolutely not true,” Biden said, before Wallace moved the conversation to racial issues.

Trump made similar comments about Hunter Biden’s foreign business dealings at an October 2022 debate which took place after the New York Post’s reporting on Hunter Biden’s laptop was censored by Twitter and falsely categorized as Russian disinformation. The Daily Caller News Foundation, The New York Times, The Washington Post and CBS News later verified the Hunter Biden laptop archive.

WATCH:

“You got three-and-a-half million dollars. Your family got three-and-a-half million dollars and you know someday, you’re gonna have to explain — why did you get three-and-a-half?” Trump asserted, according to the official debate transcript.

“I have not taken a penny from any foreign source ever in my life,” Biden responded.

“Number two, I don’t make money from China, you do. I don’t make money from Ukraine, you do. I don’t make money from Russia. You made three-and-a-half million dollars, Joe, and your son gave you— They even have a statement that we have to give 10% to the big man. You’re the big man, I think. I don’t know, maybe you’re not. But you’re the big man, I think. Your son said we have to give 10% to the big man,” Trump said later in the debate.

“I carried out U.S. policy. Not one, single, solitary thing was out of line. Not a single thing, number one. Number two, the guy who got in trouble in Ukraine was this guy, trying to bribe the Ukrainian government to say something negative about me, which they would not do, and did not do, because it never, ever, ever happened. My son has not made money in terms of this thing about — what are you talking about — China. I have not had it. The only guy that made money from China is this guy. He’s the only one. Nobody else has made money from China,” Biden hit back.

“His son didn’t have a job for a long time, was sadly no longer in the military service, I won’t get into that. And he didn’t have a job. As soon as he became vice president, Burisma — not the best, not the best reputation in the world — I hear they paid him 183,000 a month. Listen to this, 183, and they gave him a $3 million upfront payment, and he had no energy experience. That’s 100% dishonest,” Trump followed up.

“Look, there are 50 former national intelligence folks who said that what this, he’s accusing me of, is a Russian plan. They have said that this has all the characteristics — four, five former heads of the CIA, both parties, say what he’s saying is a bunch of garbage. Nobody believes it except him and his good friend Rudy Giuliani,” Biden said later on.

Joe Biden was citing a letter signed by 51 former intelligence officials which claimed Hunter Biden’s laptop was part of a “Russian information operation” without evidence to back it up. One of the letter’s signatories, former CIA official Michael Morrell, testified to the House Judiciary Committee about how Biden Secretary of State Tony Blinken orchestrated the letter, which Morrell signed to help Biden defeat Trump in the 2020 presidential election.

Trump’s assertions about Ukraine, China and Russia appear to be based on a Senate report released in September 2020 detailing Hunter Biden’s foreign business dealings and the New York Post’s October 2020 reporting on the Hunter Biden laptop archive.

Trump made similar assertions on Twitter beginning in late 2019, before Biden won the 2020 Democratic presidential primary. Ahead of the 2020 presidential election, Trump tweeted on numerous occasions about the Biden family’s business dealings with Chinese, Ukrainian and Russian business partners.

Hunter Biden’s consulting firm was wired $3.5 million by Russian oligarch Elena Baturina in February 2014 as part of a consulting agreement, the Senate report found. Baturina was married to former Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov and her net worth is estimated at $1.3 billion.

Hunter Biden’s former business associate, Devon Archer, testified to the House Oversight Committee Monday about how Joe and Hunter Biden dined with Baturina in the spring of 2014 at a cafe in Washington, D.C., according to a transcript of Archer’s testimony.

Trump’s statement about Biden threatening Ukraine with a billion dollars was based on what then-Vice President Biden told the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) in September 2016 when Biden bragged about getting Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin fired in early 2016.

“You remember last year I was authorized to say we’d do the second tranche of a billion dollars. And he didn’t fire his chief prosecutor. And because I have the confidence of the president, I was there, and I said: I’m not signing it. Until you fire him, we’re not signing, man,” Biden told CFR. Biden made similar comments at a January 2018 event with CFR when he was out of office.

When Shokin was fired, Hunter Biden was being paid $83,000 a month as a board member of Ukrainian energy firm Burisma, another detail confirmed by Archer’s testimony. Archer also testified about a dinner Joe Biden attended a dinner with Burisma executive Vadim Pozharskyi and how the Biden family “brand” prevented Burisma from going out of business.

One of Hunter Biden’s former business partners, James Gillar, called Joe Biden “the big guy” in emails first reported by the New York Post. Another former business associate, Tony Bobulinski, confirmed to the outlet the “big guy” moniker was referring to Joe Biden.

Likewise, Archer confirmed to the House Oversight Committee “my guy” was a nickname Hunter Biden used to describe his father in an April 2014 email.

Archer told Daily Caller co-founder Tucker Carlson it was “categorically false” to say Joe Biden was not aware of his son’s business dealings, referencing a personalized letter Biden sent him in 2011. In the same interview, Archer said Shokin was a “threat” to Burisma’s business and recalled a purported raid on Burisma founder Mykola Zlochevsky’s property overseen by Shokin’s office.

In addition, Hunter Biden received payments from a Chinese firm, CEFC China Energy, whose chairman, Ye Jianming, was linked to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and People’s Liberation Army (PLA), according to the senate report.

IRS whistleblower Gary Shapley testified to the House Ways & Means Committee about a threatening text Hunter Biden allegedly sent a CEFC associate with Joe Biden in the room. Shapley provided a transcript of former Biden business associate Rob Walker’s interview with the FBI where Walker said Joe Biden met with CEFC officials in May 2017, shortly after his vice presidency concluded.

The House Oversight Committee revealed in late June a text allegedly sent by Hunter Biden on Aug. 3, 2017 to a CEFC associate about how the Bidens are “the best” at assisting his boss. The next day, Owasco P.C., one of Biden’s shell companies, was paid $100,000 by CEFC, the committee disclosed.

On Aug. 8, 2017, Hudson West III, a business entity formed by Hunter Biden and a CEFC business partner, was wired an estimated $5 million, the Senate report found.

Hunter Biden earned about $1 million from Hudson West III in 2017, according to his guilty plea agreement with Department of Justice (DOJ) prosecutors which fell apart in court. Biden admitted during his late July court appearance he made $664,000 from CEFC in 2017, court transcripts show.

IRS whistleblower Joseph Ziegler testified to the House Oversight Committee that Hunter Biden and his business associates took an estimated $17 million from Chinese, Ukrainian and Romanian business interests. The Oversight Committee released a memo in May 2023 outlining more than $10 million in alleged payments from foreign companies to Biden family members.

Two months prior, the House Oversight Committee released a memo showing Walker took $3 million from a Chinese energy company and allegedly sent $1.3 million worth of payments to Biden family members. Republican Kentucky Rep. James Comer, Chair of the House Oversight Committee, said in July more bank records would be released showing Hunter Biden’s alleged dealings with Russian business partners.

The White House said President Biden “was not in business with his son” when Shapley’s testimony was publicized, a shift from Biden denying any knowledge of his son’s business dealings.

“Any verifiable words or actions of my client, in the midst of a horrible addiction, are solely his own and have no connection to anyone in his family,” Hunter Biden’s lawyer said in the wake of Shapley’s testimony.

Hunter Biden was charged by the DOJ in June with two tax misdemeanors and a felony gun charge. Both IRS whistleblowers accused prosecutors of slow-walking and obstructing the Hunter Biden case based on their knowledge of the investigation.

The president’s son was expected to plead guilty to the tax charges and sign a diversion agreement for the gun charge, until a disagreement with the DOJ about the immunity clause hidden inside Biden’s diversion agreement caused Biden’s plea deal to implode. The DOJ investigation into Hunter Biden is still ongoing and

“He confirms President Biden was not involved in his son’s business,” White House spokesperson Ian Sams tweeted about Archer’s testimony. Sams told multiple media outlets the investigation into Hunter Biden’s business dealings is an “evidence-free wild goose chase” following Archer’s testimony.

The day after Devon Archer’s testimony to the House Oversight Committee, Trump was indicted by Special Counsel Jack Smith for charges related to his efforts to contest the 2020 presidential election results. Trump pleaded not guilty to the charges Thursday at an arraignment in Washington, D.C. He continues to lead the 2024 Republican presidential primary by wide margins.

The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

Jack Moore contributed to this report.

AUTHOR

JAMES LYNCH

Investigative reporter. James Lynch can be reached on Twitter @jameslynch32.

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