MSM just as soon retire as old news the Hunter Biden story after his little plea deal whitewashing his very dark and disturbing past. It turns out Hunter was parading around again like a celebrity at the White House on Thursday night at a formal dinner for the visiting Indian Prime Minister. (Please tell me India isn’t compromised by the Biden family, too!)
Friday was a new day. The U.S. House of Representatives, some in the G.O.P. anyway, have been in a productive mood since Kevin McCarthy became House Speaker. Maybe it’s coincidence; maybe not. Maybe it will continue; maybe not. But Friday yielded the release of a disturbing report that contains allegations from two whistleblowers on interference in the Hunter Biden investigation that resulted in his two extremely minor misdemeanor tax charges he is about to plead guilty to.
While it’s true allegations against Hunter for influence peddling, unregistered foreign agency, and money laundering are far more serious offenses that Hunter has yet to be charged with, the taxes and gun matters weren’t insignificant. After all, an ordinary American without political ties quite possibly wouldn’t have received the same consideration. In Hunter’s case, though, no one wanted to dig too deep lest Joey’s name, or his ‘Big Guy’ moniker, keep resurfacing, likely requiring an unwelcome further inquiry. The hope is to push the plea deal through and get the judge to sign off on it quickly so it can just all go away. But it may not.
It turns out, the whistleblowers claim there had been an effort to charge felony tax violations instead, and that Delaware U.S. Attorney David Weiss was shut down in his attempt to bring charges in two jurisdictions. Key searches were further allegedly abandoned. Maybe there was a legitimate and rational reason to forego felony charges and further searches. And perhaps Weiss decided himself not to charge in another jurisdiction. These prosecutorial decisions, however, should be explained beyond Merrick Garland’s flat out and incredible denials any mischief was afoot. Garland is probably lying.
The House of Representatives has been doing the deep dig into what happened since the D.O.J. and Garland refuse to. They heard closed-door testimony on Thursday that revealed, not just the mischief that was afoot, but that Joey, a/k/a “the Big Guy,” was, in fact, very involved in his son’s overseas business deals, contrary to his previous insistence to the contrary. Simply put, it appears Joey lied. More specifically, the House Ways and Means Committee took evidence that the Hunter (then code-named “Sportsman”) IRS-based investigation, opened in November of 2018, and involved a “foreign-based amateur online pornography platform,” according to whistleblower Gary Shapley, who sat for a six-hour deposition with the committee on May 26th. Further, Weiss had wanted to bring federal changes against him in the Central District of California and in Washington, D.C. last year, but was denied by Biden-appointed U.S. attorneys Martin Estrada and Matthew Graves.
A second whistleblower, thus far anonymous, claims the investigation, spanning 2014 to 2019, found Hunter and his ‘associates’ received about $17.3 million from Ukraine, Romania, and China. About $8.3 million was Hunter’s alone. Investigators had wanted felony charges for his having evaded $2.2 million in taxes. By the way, there is no statute of limitations on tax evasion, so it can wait, whereas the other matters have probably had the statute of limitations run.
As for Joey Biden, a/k/a the Big Guy, Assistant U.S. Attorney Lesley Wolf allegedly discouraged investigators from proceeding with questioning about his involvement, averring there was “no specific criminality,” whatever that means. She also allegedly tipped off the Bidens about an impending search of Hunter’s storage facility. All the while Garland testified under oath to Congress earlier in the year that Weiss hadn’t been denied authority to bring charges outside the friendly jurisdiction of Delaware. Weiss had also sought to be appointed special counsel in the case at least twice, according to both whistleblowers. Each time, the Biden Justice Department denied the request.
What is perhaps most striking is communication from Hunter’s iCloud account. According to Shapley, there was a message from a Chinese businessman, constituting direct evidence of the Big Guy’s personal involvement and interest in Hunter’s overseas business ventures. Shapley recounted:
“[W]e obtained a July 30th, 2017, WhatsApp message from Hunter Biden to Henry Zhao, where Hunter Biden wrote: ‘I am sitting here with my father and we would like to understand why the commitment made has not been fulfilled. Tell the director that I would like to resolve this now before it gets out of hand, and now means tonight. And, Z, if I get a call or text from anyone involved in this other than you, Zhang, or the chairman, I will make certain that between the man sitting next to me and every person he knows and my ability to forever hold a grudge that you will regret not following my direction. I am sitting here waiting for the call with my father,’”
The New York Post, which has consistently had the most thorough coverage of the story over the years, especially reporter Miranda Devine, explains:
“Zhao, of Harvest Fund Management, is a Communist Party official and his fund was associated with BHR Partners, an investment fund Hunter that co-founded in 2013 12 days after he joined his Vice-President Biden aboard Air Force Two for an official trip to Beijing, the Wall Street Journal reported.
“Hunter held onto his 10% stake in BHR Partners through at least part of his father’s first year in office as president and the White House and Hunter’s representatives have refused any transparency into his alleged divestment.
“The BHR venture was the first of two major Biden family dealings in China. Through the second with CEFC China Energy, Hunter and first brother James Biden received $4.8 million in 2017 and 2018, according to a Washington Post review of laptop records. A May 2017 email about the CEFC deal referred to Joe Biden as the “big guy” due a 10% cut and an October 2017 document listed Joe Biden as a participant on a call about CEFC’s attempt to buy US natural gas.”
Clearly, nothing has changed at the D.O.J., despite what Durham and others have recently assured the public. The White House occupant (and family) is corrupt, enriching itself at the expense not just of taxpayers but of the national security, if reports are to be believed. The entire executive branch is therefore suspect. The legislative branch is a mixed bag, with the Senate backing the executive and the House only barely behind McCarthy. The Judiciary, too, is a gamble. But what McCarthy can do, beyond continuing the investigations aßnd illuminating hearings is to demand more testimony and document production. Keep subpoenaing and if anyone stonewalls, hold them in contempt of Congress day-after-day until they comply. The D.O.J. may not help, but hopefully a judge can if it comes to that. Contempt may be the only remedy McCarthy has at this point, and he must use it.
sua sponte 