WASHINGTON — A detailed private affiliate of Joe and Hunter Biden met with the Home Oversight and Accountability Committee earlier this 12 months to reply questions in regards to the Biden household’s funds.
Republicans now say the assembly didn’t depend.
Eric Schwerin, a former Hunter Biden enterprise associate who additionally did bookkeeping work for Joe Biden, advised committee workers in March that the president had no involvement in his son’s enterprise offers, opposite to Republican claims which have led to an impeachment inquiry within the Home of Representatives.
Democrats have repeatedly cited the interview this 12 months, however a spokesperson for committee Republicans advised Fox Information final week that the committee “by no means interviewed Schwerin,” apparently as a result of the session was not transcribed like different witness interviews.
“There was a gathering however it was about doc manufacturing,” the spokesperson mentioned. “There has by no means been a transcribed interview or deposition.”
Rep. Jamie Raskin (Md.), the oversight committee’s prime Democrat, rejected the concept there had been no interview in a letter to committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) on Tuesday.
“I’m writing to specific my profound concern about baffling and more and more embarrassing efforts on the a part of you and your workers to utterly misrepresent and deny fundamental and simply verifiable details in regards to the eight-month lengthy investigation that has already taken place,” Raskin wrote.
Raskin advised that, even with out a transcript, the assembly with Schwerin in any other case adopted the identical protocols as different interviews carried out in Capitol Hill workplaces.
“Mr. Schwerin spent hours answering substantive questions from Republican and Democratic workers about his relationship with Hunter Biden, in addition to the historical past, construction, and operations of Hunter Biden’s varied enterprise entities,” Raskin wrote.
A spokesperson for the Oversight Committee mentioned Raskin’s letter was barely value a response and that the committee nonetheless supposed to conduct a transcribed interview with Schwerin.
“The Oversight Committee has by no means held a transcribed interview or deposition with Eric Schwerin,” the spokesperson mentioned. “The Rating Member is properly conscious of the distinction between a proper Committee interview and an off-the-cuff assembly.“
Hunter Biden acquired tens of millions of {dollars} in charges from overseas nationals, together with through the ultimate years his father served as vice chairman, which ethics efforts and authorities officers alike have mentioned created the looks of a battle of curiosity. Republicans have sought proof of Joe Biden’s involvement in his son’s enterprise offers and have beforehand requested Schwerin, a longtime pal of the Biden household, about money flows between father and son that Schwerin apparently managed.
Up to now, Republicans haven’t turned up proof to implicate the president in wrongdoing.
Home committees have carried out transcribed interviews with a number of witnesses this 12 months as a part of their investigation of the Biden household. The Methods and Means Committee heard from a pair of IRS brokers who claimed the Justice Division had slow-walked their investigation of Hunter Biden’s failure to pay taxes, whereas the oversight committee talked to Biden’s former enterprise associate Devon Archer. The transcripts from these interviews have grow to be key items of proof each for and in opposition to the alleged corruption of the president.
Raskin has beforehand highlighted situations of Republicans providing imprecise or deceptive descriptions of their investigatory work, resembling Comer’s claims about Archer’s testimony relating to Hunter Biden’s work for a Ukrainian fuel firm.
Raskin mentioned Schwerin offered exonerating statements throughout his interview that Republicans have discovered inconvenient.
“Throughout the interview, Mr. Schwerin defined that, between 2009 and 2017, he carried out a lot of administrative and bookkeeping duties for then-Vice President and Hunter Biden,” Raskin continued. “He additional acknowledged that he had the flexibility to view President Biden’s checking account transactions and that he was not conscious of any involvement by President Biden within the monetary conduct of his relations’ companies.”
Schwerin’s legal professional confirmed Democrats’ characterization of the assembly to Fox Information however declined to remark additional.
