House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) are now looking into whether the U.S. intelligence community thought President Joe Biden’s family’s foreign business dealings posed any national security risks and whether the intelligence community warned then-candidate President Biden about these risks in defensive briefings during the 2020 election cycle.
On Monday, Mr. Jordan and Mr. Comer sent letters to Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Avril Haines and FBI Director Christopher Wray, inquiring about any potential security concerns arising from the foreign business activities of President Biden’s son, Hunter Biden. The questions about potential defensive briefings represent a new area of interest for the Republican lawmakers, who are leading an ongoing impeachment inquiry into President Biden over allegations he engaged in influence peddling related to his family’s various business deals.
“Shortly after Vice President Joe Biden left office, an entity affiliated with CEFC China Energy (CEFC), a now-defunct Chinese conglomerate with close ties with the Chinese Communist Party, wired $3 million to an account controlled/owned by one of Hunter Biden’s business associates,” the April 15 letters from the Republican lawmakers allege. “Over a three-month period, the Biden family then received just over $1 million of that amount.”
The Republican lawmakers further said a bank investigator flagged another $1 million wire transfer from a CEFC-entity to a business firm operated by Mr. Biden called Owasco PC. The lawmakers said the bank investigator flagged the transfer because of contemporaneous news reporting that the Chinese government is “targeting children of politicians and purchase of political influence through ‘sweetheart deals.'”
“The Committees seek to understand if, because of Hunter Biden’s foreign business dealings and his vulnerabilities, Joe Biden was given “defensive” briefings to discuss potential foreign interference either during his time as Vice President or while he was a presidential candidate,” the letters to Ms. Haines and Mr. Wray continued.
The Republican lawmakers pressed both the FBI and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) for any scripts, including drafts, prepared with the intent to brief President Biden, during his time as vice president, about Mr. Biden’s foreign business dealings. They further requested scripts and drafts prepared for all defensive briefings President Biden received after April 25, 2019, as he entered the 2020 election race.
The Republican lawmakers also asked the ODNI—which oversees the activities of all U.S. intelligence agencies—to provide a list of the intelligence agencies that nominated information for providing President Biden with defensive briefings. Furthermore, they asked Ms. Haines’ office to identify lists of individuals within ODNI’s Credibility Assessment Group (CAG) and other individuals who evaluated the credibility of intelligence leads submitted for defensive briefings for President Biden throughout his vice presidency and 2020 campaign.
Mr. Jordan and Mr. Comer called on the ODNI and FBI to turn over the requested records by April 29.
NTD News reached out to both the ODNI and FBI for comment regarding this records request but did not receive a response from either office by press time.
Democrats Deride Republican Impeachment Inquiry
President Biden and his family have insisted they are innocent of any illicit influence-peddling scheme.
Congressional Democrats have also cast the ongoing Republican impeachment inquiry as a failure.
Some Democrats have focused their criticisms of the Republican impeachment inquiry on the February arrest and indictment of Alexander Smirnov, an FBI informant who had alleged knowledge of a direct bribery payment to President Biden and Mr. Biden by the Ukrainian gas company Burisma, in exchange for their help protecting the company from various problems.
Republicans have tied those bribery allegations to President Biden’s role in firing a Ukrainian prosecutor and have alleged that prosecutor Viktor Shokin had been investigating Burisma prior to his ouster. Special counsel David Weiss has alleged that Mr. Smirnov lied about the bribery allegations and derived his bribery claims from Russian intelligence sources.
“Chairman Comer has repeatedly used the Committee as a mouthpiece to echo foreign propaganda while denying Democratic members an opportunity to vet or even review information purportedly behind the Chairman’s allegations,” Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), the ranking member on the House Oversight Committee, said in an April 5 press statement.
NTD News reached out to the Democratic minority staff for the House Oversight and Judiciary Committees for comment on the new Republican requests for records of defensive briefings about Mr. Biden’s foreign business dealings. The Democratic minority staff did not respond by press time.