OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
A Democratic lawmaker broke ranks with his party and openly claimed over the weekend he believes first son Hunter Biden is “clearly” guilty of having committed crimes. Rep. Jim Himes of Connecticut could not make his case, however, without taking jabs at Republicans and former President Donald Trump.
“Let me say something that you never heard a Republican member of Congress say in the four years of the Trump administration, which is that if Hunter Biden broke the law, he should be prosecuted,” Himes told MSNBC. “And it is clear that he broke the law with respect to taxes and possibly the ownership of a handgun. He should be held accountable for that.”
“If he traded on his father’s influence, he should be held accountable for that. And I’m emphasizing this because you never, ever heard a Republican say the same thing about Donald Trump or his family,” Himes continued.
Himes went on to claim that so far, no evidence has been found linking Joe Biden to his son’s crimes, which some could say is false considering Republicans have said publicly they have seen FBI documents from “highly credible” sources indicating tens of millions of allegedly illicit funds went to both men — though those allegations have not been presented in court nor have either man has been charged with any crimes.
Joe Biden has repeatedly claimed he had no information about any of his son’s business dealings.
Earlier this week, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan announced a timeline for testimony before the panel from David Weiss, the U.S. attorney-turned-special counsel who recently indicted first son Hunter Biden on a gun-related charge.
“David Weiss has committed to come in front of the committee on Oct. 18, so we can look forward to that,” Jordan said.
Jordan also presented alleged evidence linking President Biden to his son, who, according to his attorney George Mesires, served on the board of Ukrainian energy corporation Burisma Holdings from 2014 to 2019.
“You can boil this” question of Joe Biden’s alleged corruption “down to the Burisma situation,” Jordan noted further.
“Burisma, I think, captures it all. Hunter Biden gets put on the board; gets paid a lot of money. Fact No. 2: He wasn’t qualified to be on the board. Fact No. 3: The Burisma executives asked him, ‘Can you help us with the pressure we are facing?’ Fact No. 4: Joe Biden gets [Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin] fired — leverages American tax dollars to accomplish that,” he continued.
“And then what does the [Attorney General Merrick] Garland Justice Department do?” Jordan asked. “They try to sweep it under the rug, so much so that they allowed the statute of limitations to lapse for the most serious … felony tax concerns Hunter Biden had in 2014 and 2015. They let it lapse because those were the years that dealt with the Burisma income,” he noted further.
Newsmax added:
But, according to the New York Post’s reporting, this appears to be inaccurate. The Post reports that an FBI whistleblower has alleged that then-Vice President Biden “pushed for Shokin’s ouster because he was investigating gas company Burisma.” The whistleblower also suggested that “Burisma CEO Mykola Zlochevsky claimed he had ‘bribed’ the Bidens for $5 million each — partly to get Shokin fired.”
After he left the vice presidency, Biden famously admitted to what appeared to be a “quid pro quo” during an event sponsored by the Council on Foreign Relations. Biden said he had traveled to Kyiv on orders from then-President Barack Obama and demanded that the prosecutor be fired or he would withhold $1 billion in assistance.
Hunter Biden, who was charged as a result of Special Counsel David Weiss’s multi-year investigation, entered a not guilty plea in U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware on Tuesday morning.
The president’s son has been accused of making false statements about his drug use on a form he kept for 11 days in October 2018.
If he is found guilty, he could spend up to 25 years in prison.
