In December of 2020, after the election of his father, “Hunter Biden...announced…that federal prosecutors in Delaware (were) investigating his ‘tax affairs’…looking into Hunter’s business dealings in China and elsewhere, including scrutinizing whether he may have committed tax crimes stemming from those overseas business dealings.”
That investigation dated back to 2018, and “has expanded to include potential violations of foreign lobbying and money laundering laws. Prosecutors called on Biden’s associates and other witnesses to testify before a grand jury…on whether Biden broke the law through his business relationships in Ukraine, China, Kazakhstan, and elsewhere…”
Once the existence of the laptop was revealed, “(t)he FBI subpoenaed (that) laptop and hard drive…in connection with (the above-described) money laundering investigation, according to a new report…’The FBI cannot open a case without predication, so they believed there was predication for criminal activity,’ a government official told Fox News. ‘This means there was sufficient evidence to believe that there was criminal conduct…(i)f a criminal case was opened and subpoenas were issued, that means there is a high likelihood that both the laptop and hard drive contain fruits of criminal activity,” the official said.”
As noted with undisguised glee by the New York Post, “(i)n the heat of the presidential race of 2020, the (New York) Times never missed a chance to cast doubt on the laptop, saying the information was ‘purported’ and quoting a letter from former Democratic officials who claimed — with no evidence — that it was Russian disinformation. As recently as September 2021, the Times called the laptop ‘unsubstantiated’ in a news story…(t)hen…in passing, (The Times) notes that Hunter’s laptop is legitimate. ‘People familiar with the investigation said prosecutors had examined emails between Mr. Biden, Mr. Archer and others about Burisma and other foreign business activity,’ the Times writes. ‘Those emails were…from a cache of files that appears to have come from a laptop abandoned by Mr. Biden in a Delaware repair shop. The email and others in the cache were authenticated by people familiar with them and with the investigation.’ Authenticated!!! You don’t say. You mean, when a newspaper actually does reporting on a topic and doesn’t just try to whitewash coverage for Joe Biden, it discovers it’s actually true?”
There are several reasons the information contained in Hunter Biden’s laptop has been dismissed for so long. Media support for Joe Biden (or more specifically, disdain for President Trump) is one probable answer; Left-leaning sentiment and support for Democratic policies and politicians by much of the legacy media is another. There are also a variety of reasons for the sudden acceptance of the Hunter Biden story by media outlets who actively suppressed the initial revelation – among these, increased disappointment in the Biden Administration’s competence, and growing doubt in Biden’s personal capacity to fulfill the duties of his office. Both of these issues are increasingly the subject of public outcry and dissatisfaction.
But of more significance is the fact that the revelations of corruption contained in that laptop are now evidence in a federal investigation and Grand Jury presentation, which may lead to the indictment of the President’s son. Even more important; the evidence gathered from that laptop points to the sins of the son involving the father.
As noted above, these investigations involve the Ukrainian business deal initially reported by the New York Post in 2019. However, more recently, the focus has shifted to Hunter Biden’s activities in China. “According to a report last week from The Washington Post, the president’s son signed a contract with an executive with the Chinese energy company CEFC in August 2017. According to the newspaper, ‘Over the course of 14 months, the Chinese energy conglomerate and its executives paid $4.8 million to entities controlled by Hunter Biden and his uncle, according to government records, court documents and newly disclosed bank statements, as well as emails contained on a copy of a laptop hard drive that purportedly once belonged to Hunter Biden.’ Hunter’s uncle James Biden is the president’s brother, and the contract in question, according to The Post, provided Hunter Biden a one-time retainer of $500,000, in addition to monthly stipends of $100,000 for him and $65,000 for his uncle…
“As the report explains, CEFC, which is financed by Chinese government development banks, is tied to China’s Communist Party and linked to the People’s Liberation Army… Hunter Biden’s contract with CEFC is questionable not only because of the large sums involved in return for services that he appears ill-suited to provide, but also because of the characters it brought him in contact with…Hunter Biden was contacted by an intermediary looking to arrange a meeting between him and Ye Jianming, the chairman of CEFC. Ye had been the deputy secretary of the China Association for International Friendly Contact, which a 2011 U.S. congressional report called ‘a front’ for the People’s Liberation Army. CEFC may claim it’s a ‘private’ company, but when it comes to major Chinese entities, there’s no such thing as private and no way to politely decline the strong arm of the Chinese intelligence services.”
In an email discovered on Hunter Biden’s laptop, “one of Hunter Biden’s business associates, James Gilliar, pitched the equity stakes for key players in a firm created for a joint venture with CEFC China Energy Co. in March 2017. It read, ’10 held by H for the big guy?,’ suggesting that this person would get 10 percent of the deal. Biden business partner Tony Bobulinski, who was brought in to structure the deal, publicly identified ‘the Big Guy’ as Joe Biden when the emails came to light in the run up to the 2020 election.”
“Although the White House has disputed the email was a reference to Joe Biden,” according to the Daily Mail, “others use the same moniker for him going as far back as 2013. A trade union lobbyist referred to President Biden as the ‘big guy’ when he emailed Hunter trying to arrange a meeting between his union boss and the then-vice president in 2014. And an executive at a wealth management firm used the moniker for Joe when he wrote to Hunter about the vice president’s appearance at a 2013 private club dinner in Delaware…. (a) witness testifying to a grand jury in Hunter’s probe was asked who the ‘big guy’ was in the Chinese deal, a source told the New York Post.”
This matter is now in the hands of a federal Grand Jury. It seems highly likely that Hunter Biden will be indicted for several counts of money laundering, tax fraud, and failure to register as a foreign agent charges. Is it also possible that Joe Biden, the “big guy,” will at the very least be named an “unindicted co-conspirator,” if not indicted himself?
If so, than Donald Trump was right again – Joe Biden is nothing more than another “corrupt politician.”
Illustration: Pixabay
Judge John Wilson served on the bench in NYC.