Hunter Biden and his attorneys blew up the plea deal he had arranged with Merrick Garland’s Department of Justice. Then the deal was back on. Now it’s off.
The president is distancing himself:
KARINE JEAN-PIERRE on Hunter Biden:
“Hunter Biden is a private citizen and this was a personal matter for him” pic.twitter.com/TtVioo4ijY
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) July 26, 2023
U.S. District Judge Maryellen Noreika asked a simple question about this deal, one that even the media — never mind voters and Republicans — wanted answers to: “I really don’t understand the scope” of the agreement.
In laymen’s terms: Is this it? Is Hunter under any other criminal investigations? Could he be prosecuted for anything else — including Foreign Agents Registration Act [FARA] violations — within the applicable years of this agreement?
When the government lawyers said that Hunter could be prosecuted for other crimes, Hunter’s lawyers called the deal off.
The attorneys huddled. The deal was back on!
Then, and this is just a wild guess, Hunter’s attorney called the deal off again — probably because admitting to the tax-evasion scheme on money from foreign entities would amount to a tacit admission of FARA violations and help make the FARA case easier for the feds.
Another question raised relates to special counsel Robert Hur, the attorney in charge of investigating the documents that Joe Biden mishandled. Did Hunter have access to the classified documents that Joe had in his possession? Do these documents include ones on Ukraine? If so, will Hunter be subject to that investigation?
Republican Pressure on Hunter Biden Investigation
Since the DOJ–Hunter Biden deal, the Republicans have instigated an investigation of their own. They’ve proven, with multiple witnesses, that the DOJ interfered with the IRS investigation into Hunter. They proved that the FBI knew Hunter’s laptop was legitimate months before the election of Joe Biden. They’ve proven payments made to Hunter Biden with Joe Biden in the same room — and on the phone with the dealmakers.
What we know:
IRS whistleblowers testify Hunter Biden got a sweetheart deal from his dad’s DoJ.
An FBI informant says Biden was involved in a bribery scheme in Ukraine.
And the President has been caught lying.Congress will use every tool at our disposal to uncover the truth. pic.twitter.com/60ScN7ZUs4
— Kevin McCarthy (@SpeakerMcCarthy) July 26, 202
This looks bad for Hunter Biden, Joe Biden, the FBI, the DOJ, the IRS, and the Delaware Attorney’s Office.
But Hunter and Joe Biden stumbled and now may actually be prosecuted for their crimes. When they monkeyed in China, Ukraine, and Russia to trade influence and make promises in return for millions, they went around a bureaucracy that wants to control all deals, both foreign and domestic. The Bidens ticked off the Deep State, the bureaucratic class, the agencies — whatever you want to call the permanent government class that fancies themselves rulers of the world.
These folks also despise Trump. The problem for the haters? Trump was president when he went around the government class to broker deals like the Abraham Accords and to talk to Vladimir Putin privately and Volodymyr Zelensky via a phone call, mano a mano.
Remember, Democrats impeached Trump for asking Ukraine to look into Hunter Biden’s corrupt dealings during his dad’s vice presidency. Trump was impeached for even asking questions about the possible coverup, so desperate were the Democrats and most Republicans to have Ukraine–American corruption ignored.
It may have worked, too, but Joe Biden messed up the plan — he bragged about withholding $1 billion in aid to Ukraine if the country didn’t fire the prosecutor looking into corruption. Biden just couldn’t contain his glee at using raw power to force Ukraine to bend to his will while simultaneously rubbing the noses of his domestic political enemies in it.
Aside: Keep in mind that Biden’s kid wasn’t the only Burisma connection. John Kerry’s stepson was in business with Hunter Biden, and Mitt Romney’s former staffer was on the Burisma board as well. Nancy Pelosi’s kid was part of an oil company with business in Ukraine. The country, which Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham have visited multiple times, seems to make politicians and their families wealthy.
Are the Bribes President Biden Took as Veep Paying Off Now?
Now Joe Biden is president. How many of his foreign policy actions — from the catastrophic Afghanistan withdrawal to allowing Chinese spy balloons to take images of American bases to pushing Ukraine into war and scuttling peace agreements — were products of money the Bidens received when Joe was vice president? How deep does this corruption go?
The case against Hunter must be pretty bad, for Joe Biden, at long last, is disavowing his son. Up to this point, the Bidens have protected Hunter — and now Ashley (who has been traveling with Jill Biden see here and here) — with White House stays, trips aboard Air Force One, trips to Camp David, and the like.
Why are adult children of the president living and traveling with him if they’re under investigation? The president and his wife’s actions are looking more and more like obstruction of justice. We know that this has been a modus operandi in the past: Hunter evaded a subpoena for his paternity trial in Arkansas for months by using the White House’s patronage. Oh, and by the way, in 2020, all the information from his paternity case was subpoenaed in Delaware by the state’s U.S. Attorney’s Office.
Could a paddle-boarding accident be in Hunter’s future?
It has been this writer’s contention that many of the actions against Trump — the Mar-a-Lago raid, the trumped-up charges in New York, the absurd accusations of insurrection, etc. — have been intended to provide cover for the actual crimes of Team Biden. The permanent political class hates Trump. But Joe Biden is so stupid that he’s a liability. They want to get rid of both.
This would leave room for a Ron DeSantis v. Gavin Newsom face-off, which the Democrats feel certain they can win. Even with DeSantis’ winning record, his campaign problems have hampered him, and that would make defeating the charismatic charlatan Gavin Newsom difficult.
Can Biden Escape What’s Coming?
Since Hunter’s road leads directly to Joe Biden, what choices for escape does this president have? Up until this point, the administration has attacked his enemies with spurious claims to distract from his own. The media has whole-heartedly backed this tactic, as they hate Trump. They continue, however, their mistake of hiding from the American people the extent of Biden’s malfeasance. Charges filed against the sitting president would shock.
The judge today revealed so much with one little question. She made the covert overt by not signing off on a laughably vague deal.
Some legal hawks believe this is all kabuki theater disguising the need to drag the “investigation” out beyond the statute of limitations on some of the crimes. That this will all benefit the Bidens in the end. Others say that even if Hunter and even Joe were prosecuted and convicted, Joe Biden could just pardon himself — and the whole sordid mess would end with one more feather in the elite class’s above-the-law prestige.
No matter: A new game is afoot now. Whatever was happening in secret can no longer be as easily concealed. That, at least, is something.
Melissa Mackenzie is Publisher of The American Spectator. Melissa commentates for the BBC and has appeared on Fox. Her work has been featured at The Guardian, PJ Media, and was a front page contributor to RedState. Melissa commutes from Houston, Texas to Alexandria, VA. She lives in Houston with her two sons, one daughter, and two diva rescue cats.