The Republican chairman of the House Oversight Committee released a memo Thursday claiming that Hunter Biden and at least two relatives were paid $1.3 million by an associate of the president’s son who had connections to a Chinese energy company.
They are said to have been paid after the partner, Rob Walker, received $3 million in March 2017 from a Chinese energy company associated with another company with whom Biden had dealt. The recipients of the $1.3 million in payments were Biden, his uncle James Biden and Hallie Biden, the widow of Hunter’s brother Beau Biden, Comer said.
“It is unclear what services were provided to obtain this exorbitant amount of money,” Comer said.
While the $3 million figure and the payments to Hunter Biden were reported almost a year ago, Comer’s note highlighted what the committee described as “new evidence” obtained from a subpoena of Walker’s bank records — two payments totaling $35,000 to Hallie Biden in 2017.
“The committee is concerned about the information revealed in these bank records,” including “why Hallie Biden — publicly reported to work as a school counselor — received money” from Walker’s company, the memo said.
A spokesman for committee Democrats noted that one of the payments to Hallie Biden was sent a month before Walker received the $3 million. “Hiding this connection paints a typically distorted picture and marks another depressing low point for this investigation,” the spokesman said.
Hunter Biden acknowledged in a 2019 interview with The New Yorker that Hallie Biden was romantically involved with him during that period.
A spokesman for Hunter Biden’s legal team responded to a request for comment Thursday night.
“Hunter Biden, a private citizen with every right to pursue his own business endeavors, joined several business partners in seeking a joint venture with a privately owned, legitimate energy company in China. As part of that joint venture, Hunter received his share of good believe seed funds that he shared with his uncle, James Biden, and Hallie Biden, with whom he was involved at the time, and shared expenses,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “The accounts so dramatically listed by Rep. Comer belonged to Hunter, his uncle and Hallie – no one else.”
A representative for James Biden declined to comment. An attempt to reach Hallie Biden for comment was unsuccessful.
Comer sent a letter to Walker on Friday, saying the oversight committee had identified him “as a critical witness in this case and has reviewed evidence showing you received millions of dollars from a Chinese energy company and elsewhere. The committee invite you to participate in a transcribed interview with the committee’s staff.”
Walker did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
White House spokesman Ian Sams responded Thursday to Comer’s memo by noting that Comer had suggested in an interview with Fox Business this month that the U.S. attorney from Delaware, who is investigating tax fraud allegations against Hunter Biden, should have prosecuted Beau Biden, who died in 2015.
“After a vile attack lamenting that the president’s late son Beau was never prosecuted while he was alive, Congressman Comer has now decided to go after Beau’s widow,” Sams said in a statement. “Instead of bizarrely attacking the president’s family, perhaps Republicans should focus on working with the president to deliver results for American families on key priorities like lowering costs and strengthening health care.”
Comer said his committee “is concerned about the national security implications of President Biden’s family receiving millions of dollars from foreign nationals” and “will continue to follow the money trail and the facts to determine whether President Biden is compromised by his family’s business plans and if there is a national security threat.”
The panel’s top Democrat, Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland, said that if Comer is concerned about this issue, “he will certainly be a thousand times more interested in investigating billions of dollars recently paid to Jared Kushner by the Saudi government,” he said, referring to former President Donald Trump’s top White House adviser and son-in-law. “I sincerely hope that we can work together on the oversight committee to do this urgently important investigation. “
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
