Hunter Biden asserted Friday that Republicans are trying to “kill him” to hurt his father’s presidency.
The Republican-led House Oversight Committee subpoenaed Hunter, his uncle James and former business associate Rob Walker in November to answer questions about the Biden family’s foreign business dealings. Republican Reps. James Comer and Jim Jordan threatened to hold the president’s son in contempt of Congress if he defies their subpoena, and rejected his attorney’s offer for his client to skip the planned deposition and testify publicly.
“I recognize that none of this is necessarily about me. They are trying to — in their most illegitimate way, but rational way — they are trying to destroy a presidency,” the president’s son told musician and podcast host Moby in an episode released Friday. “And so it’s not about me. In their most base way, what they’re trying to do is they’re trying to kill me, knowing that it will be a pain greater than my father could be able to handle.”
He added that Republican Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and Paul Gosar of Arizona, both of whom are involved in the impeachment inquiry connected to Hunter’s business dealings, are “not healthy people.”
“The second thing that I realize is that these people are just sad, very, very sick people that most likely just faced traumas in their lives that they decided that they are going to turn into an evil, that they decide that they’re gonna inflict on the rest of the world,” he added.
“Yeah, I remember seeing that as a bumper sticker when I was in high school,” Moby responded.
Republicans launched an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden in September to investigate whether he engaged in an influence-peddling scheme related to his son’s overseas business dealings. An impeachment inquiry memo found that the Biden family and its associates raked in $24 million from Ukraine, China, Romania and Kazakhstan between 2014 and 2019.
Bank records released by Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer showed that Joe Biden received a $40,000 check from his family members shortly after the family received money from Chinese business associates. Biden had previously denied that Hunter profited from family ties.
The memo outlined the president’s claims that he had no knowledge or ever discussed business with his son and also detailed two Washington, D.C., dinners that Biden attended with Russian oligarch Elena Baturina in 2014 and Burisma executive Vadim Pozharskyi in 2015. (RELATED: FLASHBACK: Joe Biden Called On Justice Department To Prosecute Anyone Defying Congressional Subpoenas)
Hunter Biden’s former business associate Devon Archer testified that the younger Biden spoke with his father on speakerphone while surrounded by foreign business associates on over twenty occasions. It is unknown what the father and son discussed during those phone calls.
A federal grand jury in California indicted the younger Biden on Thursday with nine charges for failing to file and pay his taxes over a four-year period. The indictment includes three felonies and six misdemeanors, and lays out his business dealings with Ukrainian energy firm Burisma Holdings, Chinese infrastructure company CEFC and a Romanian oligarch.
He faces an additional three-count indictment handed down in September related to the illegal purchase of a firearm. He is charged with providing false statements and knowingly possessing the gun while addicted to drugs.
The president’s son initially agreed to plead guilty to the gun charges in exchange for serving no jail time as part of a plea deal with U.S. attorney David Weiss. Judge Maryellen Noreika, a Trump appointee, refused to agree to the plea deal, leading the younger Biden to change his plea to not guilty.