The New York Times’ admission two weeks ago that the emails found on Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop were real was a signal to some of us that the Times was trying to get out ahead of something.
When The Washington Post, CNN, ABC and NBC acknowledged the emails were real on Wednesday, we knew something was up.
On Wednesday night and Thursday morning, multiple media outlets reported that the inquiry into Biden’s taxes which began several years ago has expanded to include possible money laundering and foreign lobbying violations.
On Wednesday, sources familiar with the matter told ABC News that an “increasing number of witnesses have appeared before a grand jury impaneled in Wilmington, Delaware,” over the past few months.
Witnesses are being asked about Biden’s finances, specifically his income from the Ukrainian energy company Burisma, where he served on the board of directors. Some have been questioned about “how he paid his taxes in recent years.”
Witnesses have included several of Biden’s former business associates, lobbyists and Lunden Roberts, with whom he had a child in 2018, according to CNN. More witnesses are scheduled to appear in the weeks ahead.
ABC’s sources said there has been no decision yet on whether Biden will be criminally charged. However, there has been debate among prosecutors “about whether Biden’s admitted past drug abuse could serve to undermine a criminal case over his financial decision-making.
CBS’ Catherine Herridge reported on Thursday morning that the probe is “broader than previously known” and that two of Biden’s former business associates appeared before the grand jury last fall.
Herridge said that prosecutors are looking into Biden’s transactions with the Chinese energy company CEFC, an entity that Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley told his colleagues on Monday was “effectively an arm of the communist Chinese government.”
In 2017, she said, CEFC signed a $1 million retainer for Biden’s legal services. The client was CEFC official Patrick Ho, who was arrested and convicted on “international bribery and money laundering charges for unrelated work in Africa.”
During Grassley’s presentation to the Senate on Monday, he displayed an August 2017 receipt for a $165,000 payment from CEFC to Wells Fargo Clearing Services. He pointed out a notation near the bottom of the page that read “further credit to OWASCO PC” and informed his fellow senators that Owasco was one of Biden’s companies.
Grassley confirmed that this transaction was being made public for the first time and said he and Republican Sen. Ron Johnson would soon be rolling out more receipts.
In a 2021 interview with CBS, host Anthony Mason asked Biden if his father had benefited financially from any of his foreign business deals. Although rumors to the contrary have been swirling, Biden replied with a most emphatic no.
The Hunter Biden investigation began as a tax inquiry years ago + expanded into a federal probe. Source familiar with the investigation now tells @cbsnews I-unit two men who worked w/Hunter Biden when his father VP were called to the grand jury last fall.pic.twitter.com/1LaXDiycWk
— Catherine Herridge (@CBS_Herridge) March 31, 2022
None of the stories from CBS, ABC or CNN on the probe seem to substantiate the attention it’s suddenly receiving. Biden has built his career upon selling access to his father. And this probe has been going on for years. So what’s the draw?
Here are some possibilities:
- Hunter Biden could be indicted.
- Evidence that President Joe Biden benefited financially from his son’s dealings could surface.
- Evidence that Joe Biden was well aware of his son’s underhanded business dealings could come to light.
- The story has simply become too big for the establishment media to hide. They have to at least pretend to be journalists.
Time will tell.
In the meantime, I think the real story is that the legacy media is reporting on this story at all.