As Joe Biden is preparing to assume the presidency on January 20, an ongoing federal investigation into his family’s business dealings will follow him. Although it’s his son, Hunter, under investigation, there are new questions about what the elder Biden knew and when he knew it.
The investigation of Hunter Biden was first initiated in 2018 as a money-laundering probe but has now morphed into much more including business dealings in China and potential violations of tax laws from earnings in Ukraine. It’s also expanded to include his uncle James Biden.
Last week, Hunter Biden announced that he is under investigation for possible tax fraud. Reports indicate the allegation stems chiefly from $400,000 in unreported income he received in 2017 while sitting on the board of Ukraine natural gas company Burisma. It was a year Biden reportedly netted $1.2 million in income.
“I take this matter very seriously,” Hunter Biden said in a statement issued by the Biden Transition Team. “But I am confident that a professional and objective review of these matters will demonstrate that I handled my affairs legally and appropriately, including with the benefit of professional tax advisors.”
Biden was given the position at Burisma while his father was vice president and in charge of Ukraine-US affairs. Back in October, the New York Post first reported emails emerging on a laptop in Delaware suggesting Joe Biden had met with a Burisma executive at his son’s behest.
“Did you and your father ever discuss Ukraine?” asked ABC News. “No,” Biden said.
“If your last name wasn’t Biden would you have been asked to be on the board of Burisma?” ABC News pressed. “I don’t know, probably not,” Biden responded.
This Jan. 30, 2010 photo shows Hunter Biden talking with his father Vice President Joe Biden and President Barack Obama during a college basketball game in Washington. (AP Photo/Nick Wass, File)
Former Hunter Biden business associate, Tony Bobulinski, told Fox News that Hunter and his uncle James used their name to also help broker deals with a Chinese company, another subject of the investigation.
“The only qualification they had was the Biden name,” Bobulinski told Fox News.
ABC News reports investigators honing in on the China aspect of the probe are specifically focusing on a 2.8-carat diamond Hunter received in 2017 from Chinese business associate, Ye Jianming, the former head of CEFC China Energy, as well as several multimillion-dollar wire transfers between the two.
Bobulinski says Hunter set up a meeting between him and then Vice President Biden to solicit his help in brokering deals in China.
“There was no other reason for me to be in that bar meeting with Joe Biden than to discuss what I was doing with his family name and then Chinese CEFC,” Bobulinski said.
“Jim Biden sat and Hunter Biden participated in it. They knew exactly what they were doing – they were dealing with a Chinese-owned enterprise run by Chairman Ye, CEFC, that had strong ties to the Chinese Communist Party,” Bobulinski said.
A recently emerged email also coming from that Delaware laptop indicates that in 2017 Hunter asked for extra keys to his Washington, DC office for his “new office mates” including his father and a representative of that same Chinese-owned enterprise.
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Again, Joe Biden maintains he had no involvement in his son’s business dealings with China.
“That’s a blatant lie when he states that, that is a blatant lie,” Bobulinski insists.
And there’s another focus of the investigation – Joe Biden’s younger brother James and his role in a bankrupt hospital business in Pennsylvania.
Senate Homeland Security Chairman Ron Johnson has been investigating the Biden family for more than a year.
“We are finding more and more about how involved not only Hunter Biden was, but James and Joe Biden as well,” Johnson told Fox News. “And he has not been truthful with the American public and it’s about time the press start asking him questions.”
The Biden Transition Team released this response to the investigation:
“President-Elect Biden is deeply proud of his son, who has fought through difficult challenges, including the vicious personal attacks of recent months, only to emerge stronger.”
Even though the broader investigation has been ongoing since 2018, Attorney General Bill Barr did not call attention to it during the election in keeping with DOJ policy against influencing elections. The decision has been roundly criticized by the president.
“Bill Barr frankly did the wrong thing,” Trump said. “Bill Barr I believe, not believe I know, had an obligation to set the record straight.”
It will be up to a new attorney general to carry the investigation forward, a cabinet choice likely getting renewed attention by Joe Biden and his advisers.
Again, President-Elect Biden has not been implicated in these investigations into his family’s business dealings. Biden has said going forward his family will not be involved in any business that conflicts or appears to conflict with his duty as President. He also says he will not treat the White House like a family business.
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