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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowHunter Biden was indicted Thursday on federal firearms charges, the latest and weightiest step yet in a long-running investigation into the president’s son.
Biden is accused of lying about his drug use when he bought a firearm in October 2018, a period when he has acknowledged struggling with addiction to crack cocaine, according to the indictment filed in federal court in Delaware by a special counsel overseeing the case.
President Joe Biden’s son has also been under investigation for his business dealings. The special counsel has indicated that charges of failure to pay taxes on time could be filed in Washington or in California, where he lives.
The firearms indictment comes weeks after the collapse of a plea deal that would have averted a criminal trial as the 2024 election looms. Since then, the political pressure has only escalated as the House formally opened an impeachment inquiry into the Democratic president, seeking to tie the elder Biden to his son’s businesses and divert attention off former President Donald Trump’s own legal woes.
Over the yearslong probe, federal prosecutors have not indicated Joe Biden is connected. And so far, Republicans have unearthed no significant evidence of wrongdoing by the elder Biden, who as vice president spoke often to his son and stopped by a business dinner with his son’s associates. The White House maintains Joe Biden was not involved in his son’s business affairs.
The prosecutor who has long overseen the Hunter Biden investigation, Trump-appointed Delaware U.S. Attorney David Weiss, was elevated to special counsel last month, giving him broad authority to investigate and report out his findings.
The three-count indictment says Hunter Biden lied on a form required for every gun purchase when he bought a Colt Cobra Special at a Wilmington, Delaware, gun shop.
He’s charged with two counts of making false statements by checking a box falsely saying he was not a user of or addicted to drugs and a third count for possessing the gun as a drug user.
Two counts are punishable by up to 10 years in prison while the third carries up to five years in prison, upon conviction.
Rep. James Comer, the lead Republican pursuing an impeachment inquiry into the president, called the indictment Thursday “a very small start.” But, he said in a statement, unless the Justice Department pursues the claims Republicans have put out regarding whether the president was involved in his son’s business dealings, “it will be clear President Biden’s DOJ is protecting Hunter Biden and the big guy.”
A felony gun charge against Hunter Biden, 53, had previously been part of a plea deal that also included guilty pleas to misdemeanor tax charges, but the agreement imploded during a court hearing in July when a judge raised questions about its unusual provisions.
The agreement would have spared him formal prosecution on the gun charge if he stayed out of trouble for two years. Defense attorneys have argued that part of the deal remains in place, including its immunity provisions against other potential charges.
The attorneys have indicated they would fight additional charges filed against him, but they did not immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday.
Prosecutors, though, maintain the agreement never took effect and is now invalid. They telegraphed new gun charges were coming earlier in a court filing earlier this month.
Charges related to gun possession by drug users are rare, especially when not in connection with other crimes. Of all the people sentenced for illegal gun possession in 2021, about 5% were charged due to drug use, according to U.S. Sentencing Commission data.
Most those cases are brought against people accused of some other crime as well, said Adam Winkler, a constitutional law professor and expert in gun policy at the University of California, Los Angeles School of Law. “It’s relatively rare to prosecute someone for being a substance abuser in possession of firearms, absent other criminal activity, or unusual circumstances,” he said.
A federal appeals court, meanwhile, recently found longstanding ban didn’t stand up to new standards for gun laws set by the Supreme Court.
Republicans had denounced the plea agreement as a “sweetheart deal.” It would have allowed Hunter Biden to serve probation rather than jail time after pleading guilty to failing to pay taxes in both 2017 and 2018.
His personal income during those two years totaled roughly $4 million, including business and consulting fees from a company he formed with the CEO of a Chinese business conglomerate and the Ukrainian energy company Burisma, prosecutors have said.
Congressional Republicans have continued their own investigations into the Justice Department’s handling of the case as well as nearly every aspect of Hunter Biden’s business dealings, seeking to connect his financial affairs directly to his father. Republicans have obtained testimony about how Hunter Biden used the “Biden brand” to drum up work overseas, but they have not produced hard evidence of wrongdoing by the president.
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I’m never voting for Hunter Biden again.
My bets are still on “the big guy”.
This is a totally honest legitimate question, that I keep searching for in all of this for years now, why is this news? I mean I know why. But I’m like searching for the “oh, okay, that must be what matters to people.” And I can’t find it. I’m serious I’d love to hear what actually matters here to the American public at large.
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What matters to you Matthew? Safeguarding our D E M O C R A C Y ?
Hunter Biden’s crime is apparently not being as successful or blatant profiting on his time in office as Jared Kushner. I mean, Kushner got $2 billion and all it took was convincing his father in law to look the other way on the Saudi’s murder one “nobody”, as some would describe him.
Prosecute Hunter Biden for everything he’s proven to have done. Right now Republicans haven’t made the case.
Lauren, protecting American democracy from the autocratic tendencies present in today’s Republican Party is always the most important thing.
Sure thing Joe. Then go after #45 with all the vigor you possibly can. Like they already are. Like they tried to with Russia-gate–a situation where I believed they genuinely might find true dirt on trump (he’s not a savory guy) but still couldn’t, after making him the most investigated president in the nation’s history.
Even I agree that going after Crackhead for gun charges is a sham. Nobody cares about his weaponry any more than they care about his flesh rifle. This is a distraction for the far greater corruption ring for which he was instrumental and which obviously involved his daddy, and for which the legacy media ran cover in 2019.
What on G-d’s Green Earth will you do when the ESG money runs out and your beloved media outlets have nothing to turn to, Joe? The money may be abundant but it IS finite.
“We can remain uninterested longer than they [the corporate establishment and their financiers] can remain solvent.”
Most of all, it mostly reflects the two-tiered justice system that protects the elite or even the little guy, if he/she/xie has the right politics. Once again, no different than Mississippi in 1961. And the same political party orchestrating it today as well. Who’d-a thunk.
Why on earth do you continue cosplaying as a centrist when you clearly agree with one party 99.99% percent of the time? You’re more partisan than the Alex Jones of the left herself, Rachel Maddow.
trump/Biden versus Bulsonaro/Lula. How quickly we turn to a Banana Republic.
Tangled up in the conspiracy theories again, Lauren …
The populism you espouse is just hacks and losers who are somehow worse than the current losers, who’s already said or shown all they’re going to do is take more off the top than the current elites. You’ve yet to sell me on the improvement, or the players, or the solutions.
They don’t have any fixes to sell, but they know you’ll gladly let them take whatever they want as long in exchange for giving you the joy of watching someone else get punched down on. For you, it appears, as long as you see some transgendered person get hurt, you’ll give up all kinds of things. Not my kind of thing, but hey, you do you I guess.
Lauren B., as the old saying goes “it is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt.”
Glad to see the justice system hold the President’s family accountable. Time to investigate the Trump kids!
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Small change. Much to the delight of Republicans, Hunter Biden has been criminally charged for a status offense, purchasing a handgun while using narcotics. Much to the dismay of Republicans, this law has already been found unconstitutional by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, the Republicans favorite appellate circuit, following recent changes in 2nd Amendment law provided by their beloved Supreme Court. Not even the six lap poodles on the Supreme Court are likely to reverse their recent opinions on 2nd Amendment just to get Biden’s son, and by extension his father. So, this goes nowhere, but it gave the Special Prosecutor, a Republican, cover with Congress. Well played, Mr. Weiss. The charges will ulltimately be dismissed, more taxpayer funds will have been wasted, and nothing accomplished. Two months ago, BIden was willing to plead guilty on this one; now it will be resovled in his favor. Which leaves us with the tax counts, which again Biden was willing to enter a plea so as to resolve and put this all away. Small potatoes, a fine. None of this sticks.
Unlike the fraud case in New York, which if it goes forward will directly involve Donald, Donald Jr., and Eric. Ivanka was already dismissed. IF that goes to trial, and if the state prevails, the Trump boys are felons.
Presidential children benefitting from Dad’s position? Influence peddling? See comment on Jared Kushner, above. And recall Ivanka went to China with Daddy as part of the official US delegation, but managed to break off from the boring diplomatic stuff to meet with goverment officials to discuss the terms of her company’s business in China. Magically, special deals were reached, but ultimately to little benefit as Ivanka’s company bit the dust.
Meanwhile, Eric and Don Jr. continued to use Dad’s name and position to negotiate deals around the world…
Hunter Biden is very small potatoes. As Texans might say, All hat, no cattle…
Go ahead, Republicans in the House, investigate away.
If HB broke the law he should pay as any other citizen would but how ironic it is that the right is going gaga over a gun purchase related offense. I could have sworn they made selling guns to drug addicts legal already. I guess now that effort will have to be put on hold until this HB thing plays out.