(TheConservativeNews.org) – Attorney General Merrick Garland insists that the U.S. attorney handling the criminal investigation into Hunter Biden will have the ability to bring potential charges against President Joe Biden’s son outside of Delaware if needed.
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) pressed Garland on Wednesday about the attorney general’s prior vows to ensure that U.S. Attorney David Weiss would be insulated from political interference, suggesting that Garland’s testimony last year “could be misleading because without special counsel authority he could need the permission of another U.S. attorney’s office in certain circumstances to bring charges” beyond Delaware.
“The U.S. attorney has been advised that he has full authority to make kind of those referrals you’re talking about or to bring cases in other jurisdictions if he feels it is necessary, and I will assure that if he does, then he will be able to do that,” Garland promised. “He has been advised that he should get anything he needs. … I have not heard anything from that office that suggests they are not able to do anything that the U.S. attorney wants them to do.”
In early February 2021, Joe Biden asked all Senate-confirmed U.S. attorneys for their resignations, with Weiss as an exception, who was asked to stay on as he investigates Hunter Biden. The president’s son revealed he was under federal investigation for his taxes shortly after the 2020 election, and he is reportedly being scrutinized for potential money laundering, as well as for possible foreign lobbying violations under the Foreign Agents Registration Act.
As Grassley continued pressing Garland about Weiss on Wednesday, the attorney general insisted, “If it’s in another district, he would have to bring the case in another district. But as I said, I promise to ensure that he’s able to carry out his investigation and that he’d be able to run it. And if he needs to bring it in another jurisdiction, he will have full authority to do that.”
The Iowa Republican replied by noting that a referral outside of Delaware would almost certainly mean that it would then be up to a Biden-appointed federal prosecutor to carry on the criminal case somewhere outside Delaware. Grassley suggested charges against Hunter Biden might also need to be brought in the District of Columbia or in California, both locations where Joe Biden’s son lived and worked for years.
“If Weiss, the U.S. attorney there in Delaware, must seek permission from a Biden-appointed U.S. attorney to bring charges, then the Hunter Biden criminal investigation isn’t insulated from political interference as you have publicly proclaimed,” Grassley argued.
Rep. James Comer (R-KY), the chairman of the House Oversight Committee, has said that former business associates of Hunter Biden are cooperating with his investigation. It remains to be seen what will be gleaned from their testimony.
Hunter Biden controversially held a lucrative position on the board of Ukrainian energy giant Burisma while his father was vice president. He also pursued business deals in China and elsewhere during and after his father’s tenure, raking in millions thanks to these associations. The younger Biden believed some of the Chinese businessmen he was working with were tied to Chinese intelligence.
“If the Justice Department received information that foreign persons had evidence of improper or unlawful financial payments paid to elected officials and other politically exposed persons and those payments may have influenced policy decisions, would that pose a national security concern and demand a full investigation?” Grassley asked Garland on Wednesday.
The attorney general replied, “If it’s an agent of a foreign government asking someone and paying someone to do things to support that foreign government in secret, yes, I definitely think that would be a national security problem.”
Grassley said in October 2022 that “protected disclosures” by whistleblowers revealed that “the FBI has within its possession significant, impactful, and voluminous evidence with respect to potential criminal conduct” by Hunter Biden and James Biden.
The whistleblower allegations relate to the duo’s dealings with CEFC as well as to Hunter Biden’s work for Burisma. Grassley said his staff “reviewed the unclassified records” supporting the whistleblower claims. This evidence was forwarded to Weiss and Garland as well as to FBI Director Christopher Wray.
CEFC was a multibillion-dollar Chinese conglomerate founded by Ye Jianming, a Chinese Communist Party-linked business tycoon who has since disappeared in China but with whom Hunter Biden had attempted to work out numerous deals.
Hunter Biden and his associated businesses received at least $5 million in payments from CEFC in 2017 and 2018, and CEFC deputy Patrick Ho also agreed to pay Hunter Biden a $1 million retainer. Hunter referred to Ho as “the f***ing spy chief of China” in a May 2018 voice recording.
Ho was sentenced to three years in prison in March 2019 for violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. He was deported to Hong Kong in June 2021 after serving his sentence.
A Washington Examiner investigation also found that Hunter Biden disclosed in text messages in 2018 and 2019 to a woman named Eva, the go-between who served as his primary point of contact for the UberGFE escort service, that his accounts were frozen temporarily after his attempted payments to her “girls,” who had Russian-linked email accounts, raised a “red flag” with his bank.
The president’s son spent over $30,000 on escorts linked to Eva and UberGFE between Nov. 26, 2018, and March 10, 2019. Eva directed him to make payments to bank accounts linked to “.ru” Russian email addresses at least 11 times during that time frame.
Hunter Biden was able to spend this much money thanks in part to Joe Biden committing to wiring him a total of $100,000 to allegedly help pay his bills from December 2018 through January 2019. In one instance, Joe Biden wired his son $5,000 while he was actively engaged with an UberGFE escort.
Grassley and Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) have demanded that the FBI and Justice Department investigate that too.
