Hunter Biden Slams GOP Probes, Impeachment Inquiry

A defiant Hunter Biden appeared outside the Capitol on Wednesday morning, delivering a scathing rebuke of a Republican-led investigation into his business dealings and impeachment inquiry into his father before rejecting demands that he appear privately before a House panel for closed-door testimony.

“Here I am, Mr. Chairman, taking up your offer,” the president’s son said, specifying that he came to testify at a public hearing to answer any of the committee’s “legitimate questions.”

House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer subpoenaed Biden for testimony last month, but his lawyers wrote in a letter to the committee in recent weeks that he is only willing to testify publicly before Congress, saying that he did not trust Republicans to provide a truthful account of what might transpire. Even so, Comer rejected the offer, arguing that he expected Biden to appear on Wednesday for the closed-door deposition and will likely pursue a contempt charge.

“I’m here today to make sure that the House committees’ illegitimate investigations of my family do not proceed on extortions, manipulated evidence and lies,” Biden said. “And, I’m here today to acknowledge that I have made mistakes in my life and wasted opportunities and privileges I was afforded. For that, I am responsible.”

Biden, who has admitted to past drug abuse, is facing nine tax charges in California along with federal firearm charges in Delaware.

But he added that he was there to “correct how the MAGA-right has portrayed me for their political purposes,” saying that for six years, Republicans have “impugned my character, invaded my privacy, attacked my wife, my children, my family and my friends.”

“For six years, I have been a target of the unrelenting Trump attack machine, shouting, ‘Where’s Hunter?’” he said. “Well, here’s my answer: I am here.”

Biden reiterated that his father was not financially involved in his business dealings or his investments at home or overseas, saying that he was “extremely irresponsible with my finances” during the depths of his addiction, but “to suggest that as grounds for an impeachment inquiry is beyond the absurd.” He said there is no evidence to support House Republicans’ allegations, adding that the committee leaders heading the have “distorted the facts.”

The rare public appearance and statement came ahead of a planned House vote to authorize an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden, as House committees investigating whether the president benefited from any of his son’s overseas business activities have been met with opposition from the White House, which has questioned the committees’ legal standing, without a chamber-wide vote to formally open the inquiry.

“The president’s son does not get to set the rules,” Comer said after Biden’s remarks on Wednesday. “What he did today is unacceptable.”