Inquiry: Biden’s son’s behavior concerning

An election-year WASHINGTON — investigation by SenateRepublicans into corruption allegations against Joe Biden, the Democratic presidential nominee, and his son, Hunter, involving Ukrainefoundnoevidenceof improperinfluenceorwrongdoing by the former vice president. However, there were a number of troubling findings regarding Hunter Biden.

The report asserted that Hunter Biden traded off his father’s name to close lucrative business deals around theworld, and that hiswork for BurismaHoldings, a corrupt Ukrainian energy company, while the former vice presidentwas directing U.S. policy toward Kyiv gave the appearance of a conflict of interest and alarmed some in the State Department. But the 87-page document releasedWednesday by the Senate Homeland Security Committee containednoevidence that the former vice president improperlymanipulated U.S. policy toward Ukraine or committed any other misdeed.

The panel’s Republican chairman, Sen. Ron Johnson ofWisconsin, hadmade little secret of his political ambitions for his report, boasting for weeks that his findingswould demonstrate Biden’s “unfitness foroffice.” Instead, the result delivered Wednesday appeared to be little more than a rehashing of allegations against Biden six weeks before Election Day, allegations that echo a Russian disinformation campaign and have been pushed by Trump and his allies.

In the days before its release, Johnson conceded in an interview that there would be no “massive smoking guns,” saying that there was “amisconception onthe part of the public.”

Its conclusions were largely the ones Johnson and his investigative partner, Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, had before they began theirwork with some newdetails from State Department and financial records. It concluded that Hunter Biden’s position “hindered the efforts of dedicated career-service individuals who were fighting for anti-corruptionmeasures in Ukraine.” It did not clarify the nature of that hindrance beyondsaying the situation was “awkward” for career State Departmentofficials, who “were required to maintain situational awareness ofHunter Biden’s association with Burisma.”