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Hunter Biden, the 53-year-old son of President Biden, was charged Tuesday with illegally possessing a handgun in 2018 and failure to timely file and pay taxes in 2017 and 2018, according to a court filing by the U.S. Attorney in Delaware.

Hunter has agreed to plead guilty to the two tax misdemeanors. He will also enter a probation agreement on the gun charge that, if violated, would mean prosecution for illegally possessing the firearm while being a drug user.

The gun charge is a Pretrial Diversion Agreement which means Hunterwill not technically be pleading guilty to that crime. Diversion is an option typically applied to nonviolent offenders with substance abuse problems.

Pretty standard stuff... which will not please a cult that wants to see Hunter waterboarded in Gitmo.



https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2...

I'm glad there's no prison. It's America's "Justice" system ...doesn't care if you are Hunter Biden or a poor black boy from one of the Liberal housing plantations. I'm sure that poor kid would've gotten the same deal as Hunter did for little drug and gun stuff.

Also hoping that the laptop stuff isn't ever busted either.

I want the Ruling Class, and future Ruling Class to see that compromising your country is just fine, and a needed step to get ahead and play in the big boy pool.

Jenna, Barbara, Neil, Melia, Sasha, and all the ships at sea.....you got it made.

The Bushes, the Clintons, many did it.

Skycrapers fall.

Libraries get funded and generations of Ruling class do ok.

Keep the torch lit.

If you don't compromise these people, I dont vote for you.

The progression has flowed along the typical pattern:

1. There's nothing to see here; it's all made up!
2. But Trump!
3. That laptop is totally fake and anyone who says it's real is a Russian agent!
4. But Trump!
5. Okay, so what? He's been under investigation for 5 years! Happens to a lot of people!
6. But Trump!
7. Look! The charges were minor! Nothing to see here/nothing to do with The Big Gu-, er, Biden!
8. But Trump!
9. Charges? What charges? That was a total nothingburger!
10. But Trump!

We're on Stage 7, soon to move to #8.

Dope1: 1. There's ... 10. But Trump!

Complete nonsense, as usual.

From the start, democrats have repeatedly said that if there was evidence to prosecute Hunter Biden, then prosecute.

And it's also important to note that this was an extensive five-year investigation conducted by a Trump-appointed prosecutor who president Biden (could have replaced but) declined to replace when he took office.

From the start, democrats have repeatedly said that if there was evidence to prosecute Hunter Biden, then prosecute.

Lulz. No you didn't. The narrative was BUT TRUMP and the laptop was fake. Who do you think you fool with this?

Besides it's totally perfectly normal for 5 year running investigations to produce slaps on the wrist!

Your last point is irrelevant.

Jonathan Turley sums it up:

TURLEY: This plea deal does have all the makings of an avoidance of any jail time, but more importantly, it was an evasion of the more serious allegations facing Hunter Biden and the Biden family. So it is historic in the sense that the president's son is going to plead guilty to criminal acts. It is going to be very controversial for critics. I think for many this looks like you ticketed the getaway driver after a bank robbery. You know, many people view the influence peddling allegation as being a very serious form of corruption with potential crime, and he's going to plead guilty to relatively minor charges.

5 years of investigations and he walks away with...not paying some taxes.

Meanwhile, IRS agents are raiding gun shops and stealing ATF forms of lawful gun owners. Wonder why they'd do that?

Dope1: Lulz.

Ah, Dope1 pulls the "lulz" card.


Dope1: The narrative was BUT TRUMP and the laptop was fake.

No, the narrative was the computer repair store owner couldn't be sure the laptop was dropped off by Biden. And then, that the laptop was handed around like a bong. Experts stated the hard drive was a mess and that there was no way of knowing who later added files to the drive.


Dope1: Besides it's totally perfectly normal for 5 year running investigations to produce slaps on the wrist!

First, a reminder: William Barr's Justice Department in 2020 investigated secondhand claims by an FBI informant that an executive at Burisma had recordings of conversations that he claimed to have made or wanted to make a bribe to Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden. There's no evidence that these conversations actually document a bribe ' or as multiple Republicans have admitted' whether they even exist.

In any event, based on what he saw Barr declined to even launch an investigation.

And let me repeat: this was a Trump United States Attorney's investigation and plea agreement. Have a problem with it? Take it up with him.

Comer and Grassley and other republicans keep whining that this was a "sweetheart deal" and there was bribery going on in River City but the one thing they don't do is this: produce any evidence. Or, to quote the legal eagle Rudy Giuliani: "We have a lot of theories, we just don't have any evidence."

Yeah, five years of dirt digging and it turns out there wasn't any there.

In the end, Biden paid the taxes due in full and was charged with breaking the law.

Which is kinda' the way it's supposed to work.

And let me repeat: this was a Trump United States Attorney's investigation and plea agreement. Have a problem with it? Take it up with him.

Tell me you don't know anything about how US attorneys are appointed without telling me you don't know anything about how US attorneys are appointed.

Trump appointed the guy that Delaware's democrat senators suggested. That's how it works.

Do you really believe that Biden would have kept a Republican in that slot????

Actually, you probably do.

Yeah, five years of dirt digging and it turns out there wasn't any there.

Hahahahahahaha! You did it! Predictable as the sunrise.

Ted Cruz called this outcome back in May:
https://twitter.com/tedcruz/status/165418751904970...

If the Biden Department of Justice ends up indicting Hunter Biden for individual gun crimes or tax crimes, that's the tell.

Be on the lookout if Garland seals off Hunter's connection to Joe and the MILLIONS Hunter made selling access to his father when he was VP.

Be on the lookout if Garland seals off Hunter's connection to Joe and the MILLIONS Hunter made selling access to his father when he was VP.

It's probably time to mention, yet again, that many things are bad - but not actually crimes.

Selling access to a public official is bad. It is corrosive to the integrity of public institutions, and ethically unsound. However, it's almost certainly not criminal. Back in the *McDonnell* case in 2016, SCOTUS held (unanimously) that even when the person selling the access is themselves an elected official, it's not a crime:

https://www.scotusblog.com/2016/06/symposium-mcdon...

This isn't to comment on whether the plea agreement was good or bad - just that the tax and gun charges are easily provable crimes, while the "selling access" behavior probably doesn't fall within any federal criminal statute.

Dope1: I think for many this looks like you ticketed the getaway driver after a bank robbery. You know, many people view the influence peddling allegation as being a very serious form of corruption with potential crime...

Turley's a smart guy but that enormously stupid... or maybe cleverly written to fool the enormously stupid.

That sentence fragment -- many people view the influence peddling allegation as being a very serious form of corruption with potential crime -- is case in point. Who cares that "many people view" something as "a very serious form of corruption"?

If it ain't a crime, it ain't a crime.

Certainly many people view a former White House advisor and relative to the president getting $2 billion from Saudi Arabia as influence peddling and a very serious form of corruption but unless there's evidence to substantiate that view, it ain't a crime.

And a "potential" crime? Even Turley knows he blowing smoke up people's behinds. They investigated for five years and there was no there there. Too bad, so sad.

Selling access to a public official is bad. It is corrosive to the integrity of public institutions, and ethically unsound. However, it's almost certainly not criminal. Back in the *McDonnell* case in 2016, SCOTUS held (unanimously) that even when the person selling the access is themselves an elected official, it's not a crime:

Depends who you, evidently.
They could have nailed him with FARA, but *chose* not to.

Turley's a smart guy but that enormously stupid... or maybe cleverly written to fool the enormously stupid.

I think it worked in the reverse way you typed above.

Everyone knows what's going on here; it's beyond obvious and yet here you are. The better course of action for you would be to wink at this whole thing because it's not like the lame arguments are fooling anyone.

They could have nailed him with FARA, but *chose* not to.

I mean - maybe? That's a hard one to make stick. Hunter Biden was pretty "hands off" in terms of his actual, documented activities with people on behalf of his foreign clients. He arranged meetings and interactions for his clients and public officials - but to prove a FARA violation you have to prove that he engaged in either: i) lobbying; or ii) public relations in a way that meets the requirements of the act. Not just that he brokered a meeting - you have to put him in the room trying to convince a government official to do something on behalf of a foreign client, or that he was a "publicity agent" or "public-relations counsel" as defined by FARA.

Did they have something like that?

Hunter Biden pleaded guilty to federal charges, he's being held accountable for
his actions.
You will not hear him or any Democrats whine about witch hunts or conspiracy theories.

Guaranteed.

See the difference?

albaby1: Did they have something like that?

Umm, no.

Hunter Biden brought some of his clients into contact with vice president Biden at dinners and on foreign trips. And he helped arrange for a Democratic PR firm to help polish Burisma's image in the US. All perfectly legal and not a violation of FARA.

This isn't like Manafort who created an extensive multimillion-dollar lobbying campaign meant to influence US officials and the press Ukraine.

Hunter is a plain old shameless druggie who spent his entire adult life profiting off of the Biden name. Outrageous? Yes. Illegal? No.

Pretty standard stuff... which will not please a cult that wants to see Hunter waterboarded in Gitmo.

Oh no, we don't to send Hunter to Gitmo....That would be a big mistake.
Hunter would be considered a hero by the Gitmo inmates. senile dad keeps releasing
the inmate prisoners there.

https://www.npr.org/2023/03/09/1162424158/biden-ad....

Hunter's wheeling and dealing expertise would no doubt convince senile dad to release the
9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed for the exchange of big $$$$$$$$$.

Oh no, we don't to send Hunter to Gitmo....That would be a big mistake.
Hunter would be considered a hero by the Gitmo inmates. senile dad keeps releasing
the inmate prisoners there.

https://www.npr.org/2023/03/09/1162424158/biden-ad....

Looking at this link, and actually reading it, I encountered this statement:

"This week's release of 48-year-old Ghassan Abdullah al-Sharbi to Saudi Arabia ' and last month's release of two detainees to Pakistan and one to Belize ' indicates that the Biden administration is accelerating its efforts to close Guantánamo, or at least reduce its inmate population to only those facing criminal charges.

Approximately 780 prisoners have passed through Guantánamo's military prison since 2002, and it currently holds 31 men. Of those, 17 have never been charged and are approved for release, but remain behind bars while the U.S. searches for countries to take them.

It's common knowledge that many of the prisoners in Gitmo should never have been there in the first place. They were in the wrong place at the wrong time, and swept up in the frenzy of the intent to make the 9/11 culprits rightly pay for what they did. Those still imprisoned but not facing any charges most certainly SHOULD be allowed to rebuild their lives as free human beings

Oooops....I thought the works here. My apologies!

It's clear there's a whitewash going on such that the NPC's and serially dishonest shills can claim there was no There There. Any digging for 5 minutes would have shown...

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12195621/...

EXCLUSIVE: Banky panky! Hunter Biden gave his passport details and income statements to Burisma executives to set up ACCOUNT with a 'corrupt' foreign bank that was shut down for breaking money laundering rules
Ukrainian gas firm Burisma worked with Hunter Biden to set up an account in Malta at Satabank, emails from the First Son's laptop reveal
Satabank was shut down in 2018 after an investigation found 'gross deficiencies' in its adherence to the country's anti-laundering and terror financing laws
Emails show Hunter gave income statements, passport details and utility bills to a Burisma executive to set up an account at the now-defunct bank in 2016

Dope1: It's clear there's a whitewash going on such that the NPC's and serially dishonest shills can claim there was no There There. Any digging for 5 minutes would have shown...

Desperate much?

From your link: The revelation that the First Son and Burisma are linked to a bank accused of flouting money laundering rules, comes after claims made by a longstanding FBI informant revealed this month by lawmakers...

Former AG Bill Barr had that information forever ago and found it so unreliable and worthless that he wouldn't even open an inquiry based upon it. I think the word Barr would most likely use to describe this accusation is, in a typical Bill Barr word, bullsh!t.

Here, I addressed this nonsense upthread but will give it to you again:

First, a reminder: William Barr's Justice Department in 2020 investigated secondhand claims by an FBI informant that an executive at Burisma had recordings of conversations that he claimed to have made or wanted to make a bribe to Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden. There's no evidence that these conversations actually document a bribe or as multiple Republicans have admitted, whether they even exist.

In any event, based on what he saw Barr declined to even launch an investigation.

Barr ran down this particular stupid but there was no evidence these conversations ever happened, no evidence to support the informants claims, and no evidence that any of the recordings or documents even exist.

But kudos for reaching into the venerable Daily Mail as a source. Did they mention anything about aliens landing here?

Well done.

Desperate much?

Sez the guy who won't just take the L and move on. What you don't understand is that this stuff is hardening the notion among the public that Biden's DOJ is thoroughly partisan and in the tank for the democrat party.

In other words, you're doing us a favor.

Keep it up.

Ukrainian gas firm Burisma worked with Hunter Biden to set up an account in Malta at Satabank, emails from the First Son's laptop reveal
Satabank was shut down in 2018 after an investigation found 'gross deficiencies' in its adherence to the country's anti-laundering and terror financing laws
Emails show Hunter gave income statements, passport details and utility bills to a Burisma executive to set up an account at the now-defunct bank in 2016

Having read the article, is there anything that shows that Hunter Biden committed any crimes?

Clearly the bank was violating Maltese anti-laundering laws - but that doesn't establish that any particular depositor at the bank was doing anything that was illegal.

No one is saying that there's no "there there" for Hunter Biden. What he was doing was despicable but legal - trading on his famous name in order to secure wealth for himself degrades our institutions, but it's neither a crime nor anything that his father could prevent him from doing.

The reason this stuff is "is hardening the notion among the public that Biden's DOJ is thoroughly partisan and in the tank for the democrat party" isn't because DOJ is doing anything wrong - it's because DJT and certain members of the GOP are out there telling their voters that the DOJ is thoroughly partisan and in the tank for the Democratic party.

The reason that some of the public believes that the DOJ is in the tank is because they're constantly being told that there's tons of solid evidence that Hunter Biden committed a lot of crimes. If that were true, then the only explanation would be that the DOJ is deliberately refraining from bringing prosecutions that it should bring. But it's not true. They had the tax and gun violations, and they were obviously ready to bring charges on that. But all of the other stuff that Hunter Biden was doing that can be proven was awful but lawful. It's the GOP's false insistence that the absence of charges isn't based on the absence of provable violations of a crime, but instead on politics, that creates the "hardening" of opinion you discuss.

[Note - this happens all the time when people do awful but lawful things. I remember having lots of conversations about this on The Olde Boards during the Great Recession, when people were lamenting the fact that none of the Banksters were getting criminally charged. They kept saying it was because the DOJ was in the tank for Wall Street, rather than because most of them were smart enough to make sure their awful behavior didn't cross over into something prohibited by statute. But trust in the government's response went down sharply, because progressives were out there saying that not bringing charges must have meant the DOJ had their thumb on the scale. Matt Taibbi was a pretty gross offender, IIRC.]

Meanwhile, IRS agents are raiding gun shops and stealing ATF forms of lawful gun owners. Wonder why they'd do that?

Discussing the alleged reason for the warrant, Van Hoose said that the IRS claims that he had under-reported his income and failed to make them aware of his millions of dollars of revenue. He denied the allegations stating anyone who runs a guns retail business knows there isn't much extra revenue at the end.

(It looks like they could see/had info he wasn't reporting the gross income correctly, I'll look.)

https://www.sportskeeda.com/pop-culture/why-armed-...

the IRS claims that he had under-reported his income and failed to make them aware of his millions of dollars of revenue.

One of the odd things here was ATF was actually advising the owner of the store on the warrant and told the owner of the store not to turn over Forms 4473. So the IRS talked with the ATF and after some discussion, the ATF told the owner to turn the Forms over. There's transactional info on the form, but no money info.

So they are looking to see if transactions are recorded, and how. So if you have a rifle sn# that goes into inventory, where does it leave inventory? Lots of room for speculation here. When 20 special agents show up in full battle rattle, you have to ask yourself what's going on.

Note - this happens all the time when people do awful but lawful things. I remember having lots of conversations about this on The Olde Boards during the Great Recession, when people were lamenting the fact that none of the Banksters were getting criminally charged.

I was one of those calling for the bankers to get jail, not bailed-out. But apparently most of them committed no actual crimes (I think a few got in trouble, as I recall...mostly smaller bankers). Which is a failure of our legislature not to make what they were doing a crime (plus allowing investment and real banks to intermingle, which had previously been prohibited since the Depression).

Which is why I changed my tune that Congress should reverse themselves on the rule about investment and real banks intermingling, and hold the officers of a bank responsible for any antics. And don't expect any bail-outs.

It's probably time to mention, yet again, that many things are bad - but not actually crimes.

Selling access to a public official is bad. It is corrosive to the integrity of public institutions, and ethically unsound. However, it's almost certainly not criminal. Back in the *McDonnell* case in 2016, SCOTUS held (unanimously) that even when the person selling the access is themselves an elected official, it's not a crime: - albaby

-----------------------

Thank you albaby for explaining the minutiae of the law whereby an apparent unlawful act to a civilian is really just an awful act that perhaps should be illegal but is not. With that in mind, the above much to my surprise says influence peddling is not a crime. But how about bribery? If that is a crime, what makes it different legally than influence pedaling. Does it depend on public official receiving the bribe actually making an official act favorable to the person paying the bribe that the public official otherwise would not have made?

To put in the Biden context, Hunter selling access to Joe to X is not a crime. Later Joe sets down with X to listen and discuss. Later on, Joe carries out official duties some of which are favorable to X. Does it have to be shown Joe would not have acted in any way favorable to X were it not for the bribe? Seems nearly impossible to prove, like so many other things you have explained.

Me: And let me repeat: this was a Trump United States Attorney's investigation and plea agreement. Have a problem with it? Take it up with him.

Dope1: Tell me you don't know anything about how US attorneys are appointed without telling me you don't know anything about how US attorneys are appointed.

Trump appointed the guy that Delaware's democrat senators suggested. That's how it works.


No, that's not how it works.

In 2018, the Senate confirmed Weiss to serve as US attorney for the District of Delaware. At the time of his nomination, he was serving as the acting US attorney for the district and was one of nine candidates whom Trump said shared his "vision for 'Making America Safe Again.'"

Nice try, though.


Dope1: Do you really believe that Biden would have kept a Republican in that slot????

The 66-year-old Weiss, a Republican, will have to decide whether there is sufficient evidence to seek a federal grand jury indictment against the son of a sitting president, Democrat Joseph Biden.


The Google is your friend.

https://www.cnn.com/2023/06/20/politics/who-is-dav...

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/hunter-biden-investig...

No, that's not how it works.

Yes, it is.

By the way. Weiss was originally appointed as acting US attorney for Delaware by...

...wait for it...

...wait for it...

...wait for it...














by Barack Obama.

Tell me you don't know anything about how US attorneys are appointed without telling me you don't know anything about how US attorneys are appointed.

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