WASHINGTON – President Biden’s younger brother James has agreed to testify next month in the House impeachment inquiry into allegations of corruption by Joe Biden during his vice presidency.
James, 74, and eldest son Hunter Biden, 53, involved their powerful relatives in various foreign business relationships — drawing Republican allegations of influence peddling.
“James Biden will appear for a transcribed interview on February 21, 2024. We look forward to his testimony,” House Oversight Committee. announced Wednesday.
Testimony is set for exactly one week before Hunter appears on February 28.
Republicans are expected to tout James’ role in a lucrative venture with China-linked CEFC China Energy, which began paying the Bidens millions for unspecified services starting shortly after Joe Biden left the vice-presidential position in 2017.
James Biden is also involved in courting Mexico’s business elite and is accused of using his brother’s political power to run businesses when Joe was a top senator before assuming the vice presidency in 2009.
President Biden’s younger brother James has agreed to testify next month in the House impeachment inquiry. NBC Newswire/NBCUniversal via Getty Images
The terms of the loan repayments from James to Joe Biden are also a key area of inquiry as Congressional Republicans investigate whether the president personally benefited from foreign ventures.
Hunter and James Biden shared $1 million transferred in March 2017 by a subsidiary of CEFC and then split the $5.1 million transferred within 10 days after a threatening text message sent by Hunter in July 2017 to an associate based in China, where he asked his father and threatened reprisals if agreed agreements were not enacted.
Joe Biden allegedly negotiated twice in May 2017 with Tony Bobulinski, the American partner in the CEFC affair, and was named in an October 2017 email as a participant in CEFC’s attempt to buy US natural gas.
Joe Biden attended a meeting in or around March 2017 at DC’s Four Seasons hotel with about 10 CEFC associates — including the firm’s chairman, Ye Jianming, who has since disappeared in his homeland amid allegations of bribery from the Chinese government, a Biden family ally , Rob Walker told firing investigators last week.
Bank records obtained by Congress show that Joe Biden received $40,000 and $200,000 in payments from his brother after James received the same amount the previous week from a law firm linked to the Biden family, which Democrats say came from Joe Biden.
A $40,000 check from first brother James Biden and his wife, Sara Biden, landed in Biden’s bank account on September 3, 2017, from what Oversight Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) said were “laundered” funds in a deal with an energy-related company Chinese government. Corbis via Getty Images
Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) claimed that the $40,000 transferred to Joe Biden’s bank account on Sept. 3, 2017, was from “laundered” Chinese funds.
James Biden paid Joe Biden $200,000 on March 1, 2018 — the same day James received a $200,000 transfer from troubled rural hospital company Americore by promising to use his political connections to land Middle Eastern investors, according to a bankruptcy filing.
Intrigue has followed James Biden’s dealings for decades — since his takeover with Hunter in the early 2000s of failed investment bank Paradigm.
James Biden allegedly predicted Paradigm would succeed because “we have people all over the world who want to invest in Joe Biden,” according to a 2021 book by Politico reporter Ben Schreckinger.
James, 74, and eldest son Hunter Biden, 53, involve their powerful relatives in various foreign business dealings. AP
In 2006, the law firm SimmonsCooper – associated with wealthy asbestos lawyer Jeff Cooper – invested $1 million in the enterprise, the same year Congress considered asbestos reform legislation.
Then-Sen. Joe Biden was instrumental in blocking changes that would have limited funding for legal payments after lobbying by Cooper’s firm.
Joe Biden’s spokesman claimed in 2008 that the money was not linked to the bill and that the Biden family’s bank repaid the investment.
Cooper later worked with the Biden family on business ventures in Mexico during the Obama-Biden administration — including posing for a 2015 group photo with Mexican guests and Joe Biden at the vice president’s official residence and aboard Air Force Two for a 2016 official visit to Mexico.
A lawyer for James Biden did not immediately respond to a request for comment on his deposition.
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Source: thtrangdai.edu.vn/en/
