James Biden, the brother of President Joe Biden, abruptly changed course on claims he wasn’t involved in a business deal between Hunter Biden and a Chinese corporation after U.S. House investigators presented documents containing his signature, according to insiders familiar with his testimony.
The business deal, which took place in 2017, proposed a joint venture agreement between Biden associates and CEFC, a Chinese company linked to the country’s communist government. Documents from that time obtained by investigators revealed James Biden signed an agreement memorandum alongside Hunter and another associate, a discovery directly at odds with James Biden’s previous testimony that he had no knowledge of the deal.
House Republicans continue to conduct a wide-ranging investigation into earnings among Biden family members during President Biden’s time as vice president and in the following years. House Oversight Chair James Comer (R-KY) has publicly detailed a network of shell companies that accepted profits from deals like the one with CEFC, doling out proceeds between other shells and ultimately family members including James and his wife Sarah. From there, bank records show, the couple forwarded $40,000 to President Biden’s personal bank account, labeling the transaction a loan repayment.
The CEFC deal is a notable moment in the Biden family’s overseas business dealings because of text messages between Hunter Biden and a Chinese business associate that hinted at political repercussions if a $5 million advance payment was not made immediately.
“I am sitting here with my father and we would like to understand why the commitment made has not been fulfilled. Tell the director that I would like to resolve this now before it gets out of hand, and now means tonight. And, Z, if I get a call or text from anyone involved in this other than you, Zhang, or the chairman, I will make certain that between the man sitting next to me and every person he knows and my ability to forever hold a grudge that you will regret not following my direction. I am sitting here waiting for the call with my father,” the text reads, according to the Daily Caller.
U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA) has added to the investigation by revealing that the joint venture, SinoHawk, never received the promised seed funding. However, $5 million was ultimately transferred to a separate joint entity, Hudson West III, later that year.
Members of SinoHawk who were cut out of the deal, including former Biden business associate Tony Bobulinski, have testified that President Biden was intimately aware of efforts to defraud others as part of their machinations to trade on the family name after years in the White House.
“[T]he Biden family — Joe’s son Hunter and his brother Jim — knowingly and aggressively defrauded me as the CEO of SinoHawk Holdings and as a member of Oneida Holdings, LLC, at the end of July 2017” and that “the Biden family violated their fiduciary duties to SinoHawk and Oneida as they enriched themselves at the CEFC trough,” Bobulinski told lawmakers earlier this month.