Tipsheet

Flashback: Hunter Biden Attempted Racist Blame-Shift During Firearm Investigation

Guy Benson
Guy Benson  |  June 26, 2023 10:15 AM

A big part of my job list to follow the news closely, so I thought I was by and large fully up to speed on the still-unfolding alleged Biden family corruption saga.  But in an on-air conversation with Mary Katharine Ham last week, I learned something I'd never heard before. It's a relatively small detail, reported more than two years ago by Politico, in the context of Hunter Biden's gun case.  You likely already know that the president's son lied on a federal background check form in order to purchase a firearm, which is a felony -- for which the younger Biden will escape any meaningful consequence thanks to a special arrangement that critics argue shouldn't have been available to him under the law.  You may also be aware that a few weeks later, in 2018, Hunter's girlfriend and sister-in-law (the widow of his deceased brother) disposed of the handgun in a garbage receptacle near a school.  This prompted an investigation, then accusations of  attempted Secret Service interference:

Delaware police began investigating, concerned that the trash can was across from a high school and that the missing gun could be used in a crime, according to law enforcement officials and a copy of the police report obtained by POLITICO. But a curious thing happened at the time: Secret Service agents approached the owner of the store where Hunter bought the gun and asked to take the paperwork involving the sale, according to two people, one of whom has firsthand knowledge of the episode and the other was briefed by a Secret Service agent after the fact. The gun store owner refused to supply the paperwork, suspecting that the Secret Service officers wanted to hide Hunter’s ownership of the missing gun in case it were to be involved in a crime, the two people said. The owner, Ron Palmieri, later turned over the papers to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, which oversees federal gun laws. The Secret Service says it has no record of its agents investigating the incident...

"The incident did not result in charges or arrests. But the alleged involvement of the Secret Service remains a mystery," the Politico story noted, adding, "any involvement by the Secret Service on behalf of the Biden family or on its own initiative would be inappropriate interference in an incident that was already being investigated by Delaware State Police with the involvement of the FBI, according to law enforcement officials."  The Secret Service said at the time that they had "no record" of the incident, to which multiple witnesses attested, and declined to comment for the story.  If I recall correctly, that's where I stopped reading back when the article was published in 2021.  And so I missed this:

Look over there at those suspicious brown men, officers. Classy. Then came this:

When a police officer asked Hunter whether the gun had been used in a crime, the officer reported that Hunter “became very agitated with me and asked me if I was intentionally trying to make him mad,” according to the report...An officer asked Hunter whether he had called his father about the incident before he arrived. Hunter responded, “I have never called my dad for anything,” according to the police report.

He's never called his father for anything -- except, allegedly, to swing by meetings with foreign business associates.  Joe Biden infamously asserted that he knew nothing whatsoever about any of Hunter's international dealings, a claim that has been refuted on several levels.  Last week, we wrote about IRS whistleblowers' allegations about how the Hunter Biden case was handled.  Part of their sworn testimony is that the president's son texted a Chinese national demanding some sort of substantial payment, stating that he was sitting next to his father, while making threats.  Three follow-ups: (1) New York Times reporter Kenneth Vogel cross-checked the timing of this alleged WhatsApp text message with previous findings by a Senate GOP investigation in 2019.  It appears as though the 'Big Guy' threats worked:

It looks like Hunter invoked his dad's name, warned a Chinese associate to deliver lucrative payments in short order, then got paid millions within a matter of days.  Miranda Devine told me late last week that a six-figure sum, that might be described as a downpayment, flowed into a Biden-connected entity even sooner.  (2) Amid suggests that the damning-looking text message might have been a fabrication (I was waiting for someone to call it "Russian disinformation"), a statement from Hunter Biden's attorney strongly points to its authenticity.  This is very much not a denial, coupled with an excuse about his client's addiction problem and an insistence that the exchange bore "no connection" to any other member of the Biden family -- followed by a deflection to attacking the whistleblowers' credibility:

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The White House has refused to say whether Joe and Hunter Biden were together when that message was sent, though publicly-available photographs and records appear to confirm that both father and son were both at the same family property around the days in question. (3) Kimberly Strassel wrote on Friday that the whistleblowers have also alleged that two Biden appointees refused to bring charges against the president's son in their respective and relevant jurisdictions, and that the Trump-appointed prosecutor running the investigation said as much.  The DOJ denied this:

According to Mr. Shapley, the Weiss team was prepared to pursue these charges but was blocked by Biden appointees—despite Attorney General Merrick Garland’s public claim of Mr. Weiss’s independence. Mr. Shapley notes that the proper venue for a tax case is where a subject resides or a return is filed; in Hunter’s case, the District of Columbia or California. But he says the U.S. attorney in the capital, Matthew Graves, refused to bring charges, and when Mr. Weiss asked for authority to bring charges there, he “was denied.” Mr. Shapley said U.S. Attorney Martin Estrada of California’s Central District, similarly declined to bring charges. Messrs. Graves and Estrada were both appointed by Joe Biden. The Justice Department told the Journal on Thursday: “As both the Attorney General and U.S. Attorney David Weiss have said, U.S. Attorney Weiss has full authority over this matter, including responsibility for deciding where, when, and whether to file charges as he deems appropriate.”

Many people cited the denial as a destruction of the whistleblowers' integrity and accuracy.  But it looks like they've got receipts -- and the Justice Department and its leader could have some serious explaining to do:

Attorney General Merrick Garland rejected all of this on Friday:

The attorney general denied the assertions made by the I.R.S. officials during a news conference at the Justice Department’s headquarters, saying he had given Mr. Weiss “complete authority” to “continue his investigation and to make a decision to prosecute any way in which he wanted to and in any district in which he wanted to.” He scoffed at the idea that Mr. Weiss, a veteran prosecutor would have wanted to be designated as a special counsel, given the authority he already possessed as a U.S. attorney. “The only person who has the authority to make someone a special counsel, or refuse to make them a special counsel, is the attorney general,” Mr. Garland said, adding: “Mr. Weiss never made that request.”

Either the whistleblowers are lying with great specificity, and are also lying about the witnesses and paper trail, or Garland is lying about the scope of Weiss' authority, or Weiss lied to the witnesses about the scope of his authority.  Someone is not telling the truth.  If the dishonesty is coming from the DOJ side of this, which is my best guess, that would be yet another blow to the institution.  Americans should demand answers. It looks like House Republicans are prepared to get them. I'll leave you with this:

Left out of Kristof's astoundingly whitewashed hackery dressed up as a redemption story is this current conduct of the president's son and family, including the president:

In the same week Hunter got the good news he won’t be going to jail or even trial for any of his now-admitted crimes, he also settled with the mother of his now 4-year-old child, Navy Joan, in a prolonged fight. Using $800-an-hour lawyers and a $6 million private jet borrowed from a friend, Biden has flown back and forth to Arkansas since 2019 to attempt to deny his own child anything a father should give. After stalling for almost a year, with all the class of a Maury Povich guest, a judge ordered Hunter to take a paternity test, which confirmed the child is his. Her paternity is not a rumor; it is an established fact. We have followed the science, so to speak. Since that 2020 revelation, Hunter has been forced to pay child support to the child.

...Beau is mentioned along with every other Biden grandchild in the dedication of his grandmother, Jill Biden’s children’s book, as he should be. He has a stocking on the White House Christmas mantle. But his half-sister gets neither. Melissa said her husband Hunter “very much cares about his country and his family and his friends and his children,” but the children part comes with an asterisk the size of a 4-year-old...Hunter’s settlement with the mother of his child, which will get scant media coverage, reportedly cuts his support payments to $5,000 a month and denies his daughter the use of the Biden name, which he fought to do under the guise of protecting her “peaceful existence.” What absolute crap from a man whose entire existence has been propped up by nothing but the Biden name. He just doesn’t want to split the proceeds.

The First Lady famously wrote that "decency" was "on the ballot" in 2020, a line this crew may resurrect in 2024.  Amazingly, it's her family that she sees as emblematic of said decency.