Washington — The Republican leaders of the three House of Representatives committees lead the impeachment inquiry into President Biden on Wednesday sent criminal referrals to the Justice Department recommending charges against Hunter Biden and James Biden for making false statements to Congress.
The Republican chairmen of the Judiciary, Oversight and Ways and Means panels alleged that the lies by Hunter Biden, the president’s son, and James Biden, his brother, implicate Mr. Biden’s role in what Republicans say is an effort to to benefit from his family’s foreign income. business dealings while he was vice president.
The president has denied any wrongdoing, and the Republican Party’s investigation in the House of Representatives has not yet found any evidence of inappropriate behavior by Mr. Biden. The Justice Department declined to comment on the referrals.
“Hunter Biden and James Biden made demonstrably false statements to the Oversight Committee and the Judiciary Committee on key aspects of the impeachment investigation, in what appears to be a deliberate effort to obstruct the focus of the investigation on President Joe Biden,” Chairman James Comer of the Oversight Committee. Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan and Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith wrote this in a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland and Special Counsel David Weiss.
Weiss was appointed special counsel last August to oversee the Justice Department’s investigation into Hunter Biden. He has filed tax and gun charges against the president’s son, and Hunter Biden has pleaded not guilty. A lawsuit in the case arising from Hunter Biden’s purchase of a firearm while he was a drug user started this week in Delaware.
Republicans’ criminal referrals stemmed from a transcribed interview lawmakers conducted with James Biden on Feb. 21 and a deposition with Hunter Biden on Feb. 28.
Republicans alleged that Hunter Biden “falsely distanced himself” from a company called Rosemont Seneca Bohai, LLC, and lied about whether he held positions there. They said the committees had received documents showing Hunter Biden was the company’s corporate secretary. Republicans also alleged that the president’s son told lawmakers a “completely fictional account” of text messages he sent to a Chinese business associate, saying his father was with him at the time the messages were composed.
The referral for the president’s brother stems from his alleged testimony that Mr. Biden did not meet with one of Hunter Biden’s business associates in 2017, which Republicans said was contradicted by the business associate, Tony Bobulinski, and by Hunter Biden.
“The nature of these false statements is not lost on the committees: each case implicates Joe Biden’s knowledge of and role in his family’s influence,” Comer, Jordan and Smith wrote.
They alleged that the allegedly false testimony is part of a “deliberate, calculated effort to isolate Joe Biden from the duly authorized impeachment inquiry.”
Republicans have been investigating alleged misconduct by the president and his family for more than a year, but their impeachment inquiry, which the GOP-led House approved in December, has largely stalled.
