A US House of Representatives committee on Thursday released a transcript of its interview with a former business associate of Hunter Biden, US President Joe Biden’s son, detailing overseas financial dealings.
The more than five-hour closed-door interview with Devon Archer by the House Oversight Committee provided insight into how Joe Biden’s son used his relationship with his father, who was then vice president, to court foreign investors.
“You know, Hunter spoke to his dad every day, right?” Archer said to committee members and staff on Monday.
Photo: AFP
“And so in certain circumstances, when you’re in — you know, if his dad calls him at dinner and he picks up the phone, then there’s a conversation,” he added.
Release of the more than 140-page transcript is the start of what is expected to be a probe into the business dealings.
Archer testified that over the span of their decade-long business relationship, Hunter Biden put his father on the phone about 20 times while in the company of associates, but “never once spoke about any business dealings.”
Archer served with Hunter Biden on the board of Ukrainian gas company Burisma.
US Representative James Comer, chairman of the committee, issued a subpoena to Archer in June, saying he “played a significant role in the Biden family’s business deals abroad, including but not limited to China, Russia and Ukraine.”
Archer’s testimony would be critical to the committee’s investigation, Comer said.
Archer’s testimony raised questions about the ways in which the 53-year-old president’s son used the “Biden brand” to build his multimillion dollar international businesses.
“He was getting paid a lot of money, and I think, you know, he wanted to show value,” Archer told the committee, adding that the younger Biden was not “overt” about his relationship with his father.
“But I think he would — you know, given the brand, I think he would look to, you know, to get the leverage from it,” Archer said.
“I think it’s more defensive, you know, defensive leverage that, that the value is there in his work,” he said.
Asked what value he brought to Burisma, Archer replied: “The value that Hunter Biden brought to it was having — you know, there was — the theoretical was corporate governance, but obviously, given the brand, that was a large part of the value. I don’t think it was the sole value, but I do think that was a key component of the value.”
US Representative Andy Biggs, a member of the committee who attended the interview, portrayed the testimony about the “Biden brand” as implicating the president directly.
“I think we should do an impeachment inquiry,” Biggs told reporters as he exited the interview on Monday.
Comer agreed, saying in a statement on Thursday Archer’s testimony confirmed that “Joe Biden was ‘the brand’ that his son sold around the world to enrich the Biden family.”
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy recently said that an impeachment inquiry might be needed.
However, US Representative Jamie Raskin said that the transcript proves “once again” that Republicans cannot produce any evidence of wrongdoing by Joe Biden.
He called the effort a “desperate effort to distract from [former US president] Donald Trump’s third indictment and the overwhelming evidence of his persistent efforts to undermine American democracy.”
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