Senate Investigators Seek Hunter Biden Records

Hunter Biden attends the T&C Philanthropy Summit with screening of "Generosity Of Eye" at Lincoln Center with Town & Country in New York City, N.Y., on May 28, 2014. Astrid Stawiarz/Getty Images for Town & Country

Two GOP lawmakers leading the congressional investigation into Hunter Biden’s business dealings in Ukraine and China while his father Joe Biden was vice president have requested records.

In a letter (pdf) addressed to Biden’s attorneys on Oct. 21, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, and Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), Chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, asked for records related to his business dealings, including business transactions and travel and bank records, with a number of individuals, including his father, and his brother, James Biden.

“[The Committees] are continuing to investigate actual or apparent conflicts of interest related to U.S.-Ukraine policy during the Obama administration, including Hunter Biden’s role on the board of directors of Burisma,” the lawmakers said in their joint letter to lawyers Benjamin B. Klubes, Preston Burton, and George Mesires.

Johnson and Grassley noted that the committees have identified and are probing several other business arrangements and financial transactions around the world “that raise similar conflicts-of-interest concerns.”

Chairman Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) speaks at a Senate Finance Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, on June 17, 2020. Andrew Harnik-Pool/Getty Images

“According to recent reports that published emails allegedly from your client’s laptop, the Committees have identified your client as an individual involved in one or more of these business arrangements or financial transactions,” the lawmakers said.

The senators requested all records related to any of Biden’s business dealings, “including, but not limited, to bank records, wire transfers, account balances, gifts, business transactions, [and] travel records,” with an extensive list of individuals, saying it is “part of the ongoing efforts to validate and verify the information in those emails.”

Johnson and Grassley were referring to emails published last week by the New York Post detailing proposed payout packages and equity shares in a Biden venture with a now-defunct Chinese energy conglomerate, CEFC.

The individuals listed in Johnson and Grassley’s letter include Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden; his brother James Biden; CEFC Chairman Ye Jianming; former Hong Kong government official Chi Ping Patrick Ho; former CEFC executive director Zang Jian Jun; Hong Kong financier Gongwen Dong; Mervyn Yan; and Romanian business executive Gabriel Popoviciu.

The lawmakers also requested records related to any other associates linked to CEFC China Energy, or any other transactions related to business in Romania, China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Czech Republic, or any other countries.

“Please provide this information as soon as possible but no later than Oct. 23, 2020,” they concluded.

The provenance of the emails published by the Post has been the subject of heated dispute, which has been magnified by its proximity to the presidential election.

The Post received the emails from President Donald Trump’s personal attorney, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, as part of a trove of data allegedly recovered from a laptop Hunter Biden dropped off at a repair shop in Wilmington, Delaware. The owner of the shop, John Paul Mac Isaac, said he handed the laptop over to the FBI in December 2019 pursuant to a subpoena. The Post published alleged copies of the subpoena and the receipt Mac Isaac said he issued to Biden.

Some Democrats have suggested that the emails are a part of a Russian misinformation campaign, of which Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe has said there’s no evidence.

The Biden campaign didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Ivan Pentchoukov contributed to this report.