Senator releases document in inquiry on Hunter Biden
WASHINGTON — Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley released an unclassified document Thursday that Republicans claim is significant in their investigation of Hunter Biden as they delve into the financial affairs of the president and his son and revive previously debunked claims of wrongdoing.
Grassley of Iowa has been working alongside House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., as Republicans deepen their probe of President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter, ahead of the 2024 election. Comer had issued a subpoena for the document from the FBI.
While lawmakers on the Oversight Committee have already been able to partly review the information, this is the first time the full document — which contains raw, unverified information — is being made public. Called an FD1023 form, it involves claims a confidential informant made in 2020 about Hunter Biden’s alleged business dealings when he served on the board of Ukrainian energy company Burisma. Top Republicans have acknowledged that they cannot confirm whether the information is true.
“The American people can now read this document for themselves,” Grassley said.
The document adds to information that had widely aired during Donald Trump’s first impeachment trial, which involved Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani’s efforts to dig up dirt on the Bidens ahead of the 2020 election. It was also the subject of a subsequent Department of Justice review that Trump’s Attorney General William Barr launched in 2020 and closed later that year.
Grassley’s office said the FBI told the senator that the document was related to an ongoing matter.
White House spokesman Ian Sams said Thursday, “It is remarkable that congressional Republicans, in their eagerness to go after President Biden regardless of the truth, continue to push claims that have been debunked for years.”
Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland, the top Democrat on the Oversight panel, said the document released by Republicans “records the unverified, secondhand, years-old allegations” that were already shown to be not true during the 2019 impeachment hearings.
Grassley said while the FBI had released a redacted version to lawmakers, he was able to provide a fuller document because whistleblowers made it available to him.
Hunter Biden pleaded guilty last month to misdemeanor charges over his finances after years of failing to pay taxes. Republicans have denounced the agreement with federal prosecutors as a “sweetheart deal.”
The top prosecutor in the case, U.S. Attorney David Weiss in Delaware, has said he is willing to testify before the House panel once he is legally able to share information with Congress without violating the longstanding department policy on discussing an ongoing investigation.
Testimony from Justice Department officials could come after Hunter Biden appears for his plea hearing next week.
BREACH OF ETHICS
On Friday, Hunter Biden’s attorney requested that a congressional ethics panel take action against Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., citing her use of sexually explicit images of the president’s son that she displayed during a congressional hearing earlier this week.
“Your colleague has lowered herself, and by extension the entire House of Representatives, to a new level of abhorrent behavior that blatantly violates House Ethics rules and standards of official conduct,” Abbe Lowell wrote in a fourpage letter sent to the Office of Congressional Ethics. “If the OCE takes its responsibilities seriously, it will promptly and decisively condemn and discipline Ms. Greene for her latest actions.”
Lowell wrote that he was updating an earlier request, sent in April, that sought an investigation into various comments Greene had made about Hunter Biden. That letter cited social media posts in which Greene accused the 53-year-old Biden of being linked to “an Eastern prostitution or human trafficking ring.”
She had also posted photos of Hunter Biden driving his niece and her cousin in President Biden’s convertible, falsely alleging that he was “on crack” and with prostitutes.
The Office of Congressional Ethics is an independent, nonpartisan entity charged with reviewing allegations of misconduct by House members and, when appropriate, referring matters to the House Ethics Committee, which is composed of lawmakers and divided equally between the parties. All OCE investigations are confidential, and the office declined to comment.
Greene’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Hunter Biden has acknowledged suffering from a serious drug problem at the time the photos were taken, and he has written extensively about his struggles with addiction.
Lowell noted in his letter that while the faces of other people in the photographs were blocked with black boxes, Hunter Biden’s face was not censored.
Of Greene, Lowell wrote: “None of her actions or statements could possibly be deemed to be part of any legitimate legislative activity, as is clear from both the content of her statements and her conduct and the forums she uses to spew her unhinged rhetoric.”