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According to newly released testimony from two Internal Revenue Service whistleblowers, Hunter Biden once invoked his father when he threatened a Chinese business partner for payment.
During a press conference addressing the allegations of the Biden administration interfering with U.S. Attorney David Weiss’s investigation into the president’s son, House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith (R-Mo.) made the revelation following a hearing earlier in the day.
One of the IRS agents told Smith’s committee that in August 2020, agency investigators found messages from an iCloud search warrant, but prosecutors “denied investigators’ requests to develop a strategy to look into the messages and denied investigators’ suggestion to obtain location information to see where the texts were sent from.”
One message investigators managed to obtain was sent via the WhatsApp platform from Hunter Biden to Henry Zhao on July 30, 2017.
Smith’s committee provided a transcript of the exchange where it appears Hunter Biden name-dropped his father, Joe Biden:
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.
According to author Peter Schweizer, Henry Zhao is a Chinese Communist Party official and previously was a business partner with the daughter of China’s former state security minister.
“Zhao was also a key figure for Biden prospects in China,” Schweizer noted. “His fund participated in BHR, where Hunter Biden received a board seat.”
Ladies and gentleman: JOE BIDEN WAS IN THE ROOM pic.twitter.com/sGEd09Ljbv
— Geoffrey Ingersoll (@GPIngersoll) June 22, 2023
The deputy director of the FBI essentially admitted under oath that a document allegedly containing evidence that then-Vice President Joe Biden took millions of dollars in bribe money from a Ukrainian national during testimony on Monday.
Under grilling from Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), a former state attorney general, Paul Abbate said that the document — an “FD-1023″ that House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) has said contains information indicating that Bident took a $5 million bribe — is unclassified, but would not commit to releasing it to the public.
Here’s a partial transcript:
HAWLEY: So no, we’ve confirmed that the document exists, that’s progress because the FBI director originally denied that it exists. Why did he do that?
ABBATE: We have already and previously acknowledged the existence of the document.
HAWLEY: Yeah, after you first denied it. When a member of this committee read it. Let’s get the record straight, the FBI director originally said it doesn’t exist. Then Sen. Grassley said he’s read it. Then he said, “Oh, OK, gotcha, I guess it does exist.” Now you’re going back and forth with members of this committee about what’s in it. Why don’t you just release it? Is it classified?
ABBATE: The document is not classified.
HAWLEY: OK. How about just a yes or no? Will you commit to releasing this unclassified document that alleges that the President Of the United States has taken $5 million or more in bribes from a foreign nation?
ABBATE: The document has already been released pursuant to a subpoena to the House Oversight Committee–
HAWLEY: Well, how about to this committee?
ABBATE: We will work with this committee within the parameters that are established.
