WILMINGTON, Delaware – Hunter BidenThe gun case will soon be in the hands of a jury, but first he and his lawyers must make a crucial decision: whether he will take the stand in his own defense.
If he does, Biden could try to gain sympathy from jurors and convince them that in October 2018, when he bought a gun that led to the criminal charges in the case, he was in a period of sobriety and really believed he was not a drug addict.
But testifying would also pose significant risks to the president’s son, as prosecutors have indicated they would ask him questions about both his long struggle with addiction to crack cocaine and his alleged inability to pay more than $1 million in pay taxes on time.
Biden’s taxes are at the center of a separate criminal case, which will be tried in Los Angeles in September. Special Counsel David Weiss prosecuted both cases.
For now, Biden’s immediate legal threat is the federal gun case in Delaware, where prosecutors have accused him of lying about his drug use on a gun purchase form and illegally owning a gun as a drug user. The three felony charges in the case carry a total maximum penalty of 25 years in prison, although Biden is unlikely to face anywhere near that amount if convicted.
Before court adjourned Friday afternoon, Biden’s lead attorney, Abbe Lowell, indicated that Biden and his team would decide this weekend whether Biden will testify. Prosecutors rested their case on Friday, followed by a brief presentation from the defense.
Over four days of testimony this week, the jury of six men and six women heard from members of the Biden family and other people who provided intimate — and sometimes stomach-churning — details about the president’s son’s troubled past. His ex-wife and two other former romantic partners testified for the prosecution about his drug use in 2018. And his daughter Naomi testified for the defense, giving an emotional account of how she felt optimistic about her father’s recovery around the time he bought the gun. .
Biden has been sober for years now. But prosecutors have introduced text messages suggesting he was still using crack during the critical period in October 2018. Lowell has argued that Biden had completed a treatment program just before that period and honestly believed he was not addicted at the time — indicating that he was not a drug user on the gun form would not have been a lie.
The jury heard many of Biden’s own words during the trial, as prosecutors played audio clips of him reading his own memoir about his struggles with addiction. But jurors did not hear Biden’s own story about what happened at the small Wilmington gun shop on Oct. 12, 2018 — or his state of mind when he bought a Colt revolver.
If Biden chooses to take the stand, he will likely be the last witness before closing arguments, after which the jury will begin deliberating. Lowell had planned to call James Biden, the defendant’s uncle (and the president’s brother), but he indicated on Friday that he had jettisoned that plan. It appears to have been a last-minute decision, as POLITICO spotted James Biden outside a Wilmington hotel shortly after lawyers revealed he would not testify.
Members of the Biden family have been in court all week in support of the president’s son, including — on several days — First Lady Jill Biden; Ashley Biden, his half-sister; Valerie Biden Owens, his aunt; John T. Owens, Valerie’s husband and his uncle; Peter Neal, his son-in-law and Naomi’s husband; Cuff Biden Owens, his cousin; and Melissa Cohen-Biden, his wife.
