Hunter Biden’s surprise Capitol appearance leads to calls for arrest
‘Hunter Biden should be arrested right here, right now, and go straight to jail’
REPUBLICANS called for Hunter Biden to be arrested on the spot after he made a surprise appearance at a committee hearing which voted to recommend he be held in contempt of Congress.
The House Oversight and Judiciary committees each passed contempt charges against Mr Biden Jnr with unanimous Republican support. It sets up a House vote on recommending criminal charges against a member of Joe Biden’s family as the GOP moves into the final stages of an impeachment inquiry into the president himself.
Mr Biden had earlier attended an Oversight Committee session during which Republicans were pushing for a vote to hold him in contempt for not testifying in their impeachment inquiry targeting the president.
Mr Biden Jnr’s presence sparked a shouting match between lawmakers, with Nancy Mace, a Republican congressman, saying: “It does not matter who you are … who your father is or your last name. Yes, I’m looking at you, Hunter Biden. You are not above the law. You are the epitome of white privilege … what are you afraid of ? You have no balls to come up here … I think [you] should be arrested right here, right now, and go straight to jail.”
House Republicans had issued a subpoena for the younger Biden to appear for a closed-door deposition last month.
He responded that he would be willing to testify publicly, but lawmakers said he needed to submit to a private deposition in addition to any public testimony. On the day the deposition was scheduled, Mr Biden Jnr appeared outside the Capitol and made public remarks, but did not appear for the closed-door interview.
Jared Moskowitz, a Democratic member of the committee, said: “The witness accepted the chairman’s invitation. It just so happens the witness is here. Let’s vote. Let’s take a vote. Who wants to hear from Hunter right now, today?”
Chairman James Comer told the committee: “Mr Biden doesn’t make the rules, we make the rules.”
The only remarks Mr Biden Jnr made to reporters was when he was asked why he had his father on speaker phone several times during business meetings.
“If he called you, would you answer the phone?” he responded.
House Republicans allege the president and his family improperly profited from policy actions in which he participated when he was vice president from 2009 to 2017. The White House and the younger Biden deny wrongdoing.
Mr Biden Jnr’s lawyer Abbe Lowell said: “We have offered to work with the House committees to see what and how relevant information to any legitimate inquiry could be provided.
“Our first five offers were ignored. And then in November, they issued a subpoena for a behind-closed-doors deposition, a tactic that the Republicans have repeatedly misused in their political crusade to selectively leak and mischaracterise.”
The House Oversight and Judiciary committees will each vote on contempt resolutions that seem likely to result in the US House recommending criminal charges as Republicans move into the final stages of their impeachment inquiry into the president himself.
The decision on whether to hold Mr Biden Jnr in contempt of Congress will now go to the full House for consideration. If the vote is passed, it will then be up to the Department of Justice [DOJ] to decide whether to prosecute.
Shelving the contempt of Congress charges would likely further stoke conservative criticism that the DOJ is politicised, especially given that two one-time advisers to former president Donald Trump were prosecuted for contempt of Congress by the Biden administration.