WASHINGTON – House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer accused the White House on Friday morning of obstructing an impeachment inquiry into President Biden, as the White House responded with a memo stating that in had actually shown remarkable cooperation.
A source familiar with Comer’s comments during a closed-door meeting of Republican lawmakers told The Post that he emphasized the administration’s inability to produce emails sent or received by Biden using email accounts registered under pseudonyms during his eight years. of vice presidency.
Comer (R-Ky.), who on Friday afternoon sent a letter to first son Hunter Biden’s legal team seeking confirmation that he will appear for his deposition scheduled for later this month, told colleagues that his panel has received only 14 of approximately 82,000 pages. of Biden’s vice president’s emails that are known to exist.
James Comer accused the White House on Friday morning of obstructing an impeachment inquiry into President Biden. MICHAEL REYNOLDS/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock
Comer also accused Biden of repeatedly lying about his contacts with his relatives’ business partners, as well as his family’s income from China, and said the White House has not complied with requests to interview a number of officials. current and previous.
The dispute over whether Biden’s advisers are resisting document requests is a central issue as Republicans consider holding a vote in the House of Representatives, possibly within the next two weeks, to retroactively authorize the impeachment inquiry and give it greater momentum.
Biden’s son Hunter, 53, and brother James, 73, are required to testify under subpoena (Dec. 13 and Dec. 6, respectively) about the president’s interactions with his trading partners from China, Kazakhstan, Mexico, Russia and Ukraine.
A recent letter from the White House questioning the legal basis of the investigation has spurred the Republican Party’s push toward a possible floor vote. Republican leaders canceled a vote scheduled for September due to reluctance from lawmakers in swing districts.
The White House insisted Friday that it has actually cooperated with requests for documents, in an apparent attempt to avoid a retroactive authorization.
President Biden speaks in Pueblo, Colorado. fake images
White House counsel’s office spokesman Ian Sams said in a two-page press release: “Allegations of ‘obstruction’ and ‘stonewalling’ are easily refuted by the facts.”
Sams argued that Comer has received “more than 35,000 pages of private financial records,” “more than 2,000 pages of Treasury Department financial reports,” and “thousands of vice presidential-era records released by the National Archives.”
However, House Republicans point out that there are other unmet requests from the Oversight Committee, which is leading the investigation along with the Judiciary Committee and the tax-focused Ways and Means Committee.
In addition to emails from Biden’s vice president, Republicans are seeking, but have not yet received, flight manifests from Air Force Two that are believed to show Biden family associates joining official trips to countries where they were seeking business.
Comer also wants communications involving aides to the vice president and business entities of the Biden family.
Republican investigators are still waiting to receive visitor logs from Biden’s Delaware residences and information about the contents of classified documents dating back to his Senate tenure and found last year at his Wilmington home, to see if they belong. to nations where his family did business.
Comer is also seeking communications involving aides to the vice president and business entities of the Biden family. fake images
The panel has also demanded records of people who purchased the first son’s artwork since his father took office as president.
Although the Biden White House itself has expressed concerns about money laundering through high-priced art purchases, Hunter reportedly sold at least $1.3 million of his works to mostly unknown buyers, although one buyer He reportedly earned visits to the Biden White House and a prestigious presidential commission appointment.
Meanwhile, the FBI has not provided requested information about what was done to investigate an informant’s tip that the owner of the Ukrainian gas company Burisma Holdings, Mykola Zlochevsky, said in 2016 that he was “forced” to pay 10 millions of dollars in bribes to the Bidens in exchange for help to overthrow a prosecutor who investigated the company.
Burisma paid Hunter Biden up to $1 million per year starting in early 2014, when Joe Biden took the lead on the Obama administration’s Ukraine policy and secretly dined with Burisma board adviser Vadym Pozharskyi , in April 2015.
In December 2015, Hunter called his father from Dubai with Pozharskyi and Zlochevsky, former Biden family associate Devon Archer told the Oversight Committee on July 31, before Joe Biden pushed to remove the prosecutor as a condition. to receive $1 billion in foreign aid from the United States, a move that The documents show surprised other American officials working on Ukraine policy.
Comer arrives at a House Republican conference in November. fake images
Biden has denied knowing about or ever discussing business dealings with members of his family, but the impeachment inquiry has turned up significant evidence to the contrary.
Archer told the Oversight Committee that Hunter put his father on speakerphone during approximately 20 business meetings with foreign partners and that Joe Biden, while vice president, had two dinners at D.C.’s Café Milano, in 2014 and 2015, with the his son’s Kazakh, Russian and Ukrainian clients.
Archer also said that Joe Biden had coffee, rather than exchanging a simple handshake, in December 2013 with Jonathan Li, the incoming chief executive of the Chinese state-backed investment fund BHR Partners, which Hunter co-founded just weeks later. to join his father aboard Air Force Two. for a trip to Beijing.
The then-second son also put Joe Biden on speakerphone with Li during a subsequent business trip to China, Archer said, while the future president wrote college recommendation letters for Li’s children.
Hunter Biden maintained a 10% stake in BHR for at least part of his father’s first year in office as president, and the terms of his divestment remain unclear.
As part of a subsequent Chinese venture with state-owned CEFC China Energy, Joe Biden reportedly met his son and brother’s partners twice and was even branded the “big guy” due to a 10% cut, as It is documented in a May 2017 email months after stepping down as vice president.
Hunter Biden, James Biden and the president’s daughter-in-law, Hallie Biden, received more than $1 million in early 2017 from CEFC-affiliated State Energy HK, according to bank records published by the Oversight Committee.
Comer speaks to reporters on Friday. AP
As part of the same Chinese business relationship, Hunter sent a threatening WhatsApp message on July 30, 2017 to a China-based associate warning that he was “sitting here with my father” and threatening retaliation if the deal was canceled, immediately before transfer. of $5.1 million from CEFC to accounts linked to Biden.
IRS agents Gary Shapley and Joseph Ziegler, who alleged a cover-up in the criminal investigation of Hunter Biden for failing to pay about $2 million in federal taxes, said they were not allowed to acquire cellphone location data to determine whether Joe Biden was actually sitting next. for Hunter, although photos from his abandoned laptop indicate he was at his father’s house in Wilmington that day.
A bank money laundering expert wrote in an internal email published this week by Comer that the financial institution should consider severing ties with Hunter Biden because the payments appeared to have been made without “any services rendered.”
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Source: vtt.edu.vn