- The Oversight and Accountability Committee identified $1.3 million paid to Hunter Biden, others.
- The panel said payments also went to James and Hallie Biden, and companies associated with Bidens.
- Democrats have dismissed the inquiry as a hyper-partisan attack aimed at President Joe Biden.
WASHINGTON – House Republicans announced Thursday that President Joe Biden’s relatives received a combined $1.3 million from a business associate with links to China, the latest salvo in an investigation the Biden administration has dismissed as politically motivated.
Hunter Biden, the president’s son; James Biden, the president’s brother; Hallie Biden, the president’s daughter-in-law; and a fourth unnamed Biden received the payments from business associate Rob Walker, according to the House Oversight and Accountability Committee. The money was paid out after Walker received a $3 million wire transfer from a Chinese company, according to the panel.
“It is unclear what services were provided to obtain this exorbitant amount of money,” said the chairman, Rep. James Comer, R-Ky.
Comer said he released the memo in response to criticism from the top Democrat on the panel, Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland, who said the panel was prying into private lives of Biden family business associates by subpoenaing banking records.
A White House spokesman, Ian Sams, slammed the “bizarre” release. Previously, the White House had dismissed the inquiries into Hunter Biden as hyper partisan and politically motivated.
Here’s where the investigation stands:
What did Comer release?
Comer released figures from banking records from 2015 to 2017, from Walker’s account to several accounts of President Biden’s relatives, from a period when he was vice president until just after he left the Obama administration. The release doesn’t detail the full $1.3 million during that time period.
But the payments ranged from $5,000 to $300,000, either to Biden relatives or to companies linked to them such as Owasco PC, First Clearing LLC, JBBSR Inc. and RSTP II LLC.
When were the payments made?
Comer’s timeline for payments while Joe Biden was vice president:
- Nov. 5, 2015, Walker received a wire transfer of $179,837 from an account the committee continues to investigate.
- Nov. 6, 2015, Walker transferred $59,900 to his personal checking account.
- Nov. 9, 2015, Walker wired $59,900 from his personal checking account to Hunter Biden.
Under Comer’s timeline, the bulk of the payments were made after Joe Biden left the vice presidency:
- March 1, 2017, State Energy HK Limited, a Chinese energy company, wired $3 million to Robinson Walker LLC. At the time, the account had a balance of $159,000.
- March 2, 2017, Walker wired nearly $1.1 million to European Energy and Infrastructure Group in Abu Dhabi. Comer said the company is linked to James Gilliar, a business partner of Hunter Biden.
- March 6 and 13, April 21 and May 17: Walker wires a combined $70,000 to an unnamed Biden.
- March 20, 2017, Walker wires $25,000 to Hallie Biden.
- March 27 and 31 and April 18, 2017, Walker wires a combined $500,000 to Owasco.
- March 29, 2017, Walker wires First Clearing $100,000.
- April 3, 20 and 24 and May 18, 2017, Walker wires JBBSR a combined $360,000
- April 14, 2017, Walker wires $10,692 to RSTP.
The committee also found a $10,000 payment to Hallie Biden on Feb. 13, 2017 – before the Chinese wire transfer. Hunter Biden began dating Hallie, the widow of his brother Beau, in 2016, according to a New Yorker profile. The two exchanged payments during this period, according to emails on a Hunter Biden laptop turned over to the FBI.
“After a disgusting attack lamenting that the president’s deceased son Beau was never prosecuted while he was alive, Congressman Comer has now decided to go after Beau’s widow,” said Sams, the White House spokesman. “Instead of bizarrely attacking the president’s family, perhaps House Republicans should focus on working with the president to deliver results for American families on important priorities like lowering costs and strengthening health care.”
How did Democrats on the panel respond?
Raskin, the top Democrat on the committee, said after four years of investigations in the House and Senate into Hunter Biden, Republicans found no conection to the president or any other government official.
“It must be frustrating to my GOP colleagues to have even Fox News commentators rolling their eyes about this tiresome fishing expedition, but I want to stress that there always remains the possibility of doing serious bipartisan legislative oversight work together,” Raskin said.
What comes next?
The release Thursday was part of wide-ranging investigations by House Republicans into Joe Biden and his relatives, which Democrats dismissed as politically motivated.
Comer has subpoenaed banking records linked to Hunter and James Biden and others. Committee investigators will review those Treasury Department reports to see where they lead.
In response to the banking subpoena, Raskin criticized committee Republicans for dropping a demand for financial records from former President Donald Trump’s longtime accounting firm, Mazars USA.
“While I concur that the ethics and disclosure laws governing Executive Branch officials demand reform, as the actions of the Trump Administration have demonstrated, the actions you have taken are inconsistent with a good faith interest in this matter,” Raskin said.
