First son Hunter Biden warned a Chinese business associate in a 2017 text message that dad Joe and his political allies would “make certain … that you will regret not following my direction” while negotiating a six-figure business deal.
The July 30, 2017 WhatsApp missive from Hunter to Raymond Zhao was revealed to the House Ways and Means Committee last month by IRS supervisory agent Gary Shapley and made public Thursday.
“I am sitting here with my father and we would like to understand why the commitment made has not been fulfilled,” Hunter Biden wrote Zhao, according to IRS supervisory agent Gary Shapley and another agency investigator who has remained anonymous.
“Tell the director that I would like to resolve this now before it gets out of hand, and now means tonight,” the now-53-year-old went on. “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,” Hunter reiterated to conclude the stunning message.
An August 2020 search warrant revealed the exchange between Hunter and Zhao, which resulted in nearly $5 million in a series of payments to the 53-year-old’s firm Owasco P.C.
The IRS investigators alleged Justice Department prosecutors denied their requests to look further into Hunter’s texts or obtain their location data — and that DOJ attorneys suggested the first son may have been lying about his father being in the room with him.
Shapley singled out Delaware Assistant US Attorney Lesley Wolf as one of the prosecutors who shut down their probe of a multimillion-dollar deal Hunter, first brother James Biden and their associate Rob Walker cashed in on with China’s CEFC Energy, saying “she did not want to ask questions about ‘dad.’”
“When multiple people in the room spoke up and objected that we had to ask, she responded, there’s no specific criminality to that line of questioning,” Shapley said in recounting a Dec. 3, 2020, meeting with US Attorney David Weiss’ team — less than a month after Biden had won the presidential election.
The comment rankled the IRS and FBI agents who were present, all of whom “tried to skirt AUSA Wolf’s direction,” he added.
Hunter received $100,000 directly from CEFC Energy and he and James Biden took a total of $4.8 million from the energy firm in 2017 and 2018 through their third-party firm, Hudson West III, The Washington Post and a Senate report independently confirmed when reviewing the contents of the first son’s abandoned laptop
and James Biden received $4.8 million from CEFC Energy in 2017 and 2018, The Washington Post confirmed when reviewing the contents of the first son’s abandoned laptop
A May 2017 email about the deal showed the partnership would include a percentage stake of “10 held by H for the big guy,” who has separately been identified as Joe Biden by ex-Hunter associates Tony Bobulinski and James Gilliar.
When quizzed about the “big guy” email, written by Gilliar, Walker told investigators on Dec. 8, 2020: “I think that maybe James was wishful thinking or maybe he was just projecting that, you know, if this was a good relationship and this was something that was going to happen, the VP was never going to run [for president], just protecting that, you know, maybe at some point he would be a piece of it, but he was more just, you know — it looks terrible, but it’s not. I certainly never was thinking at any time the VP was a part of anything we were doing.”
However, according to Shapley, Walker later recalled a CEFC meeting where Joe Biden “stopped in, just said hello to everybody. I don’t even think he drank water. I think Hunter Biden said, ‘I may be trying to start a company or try to do something with these guys and could you?’ And I think he was like, ‘If I’m around,’ and he’d show up.”
In Shapley’s retelling, an FBI agent quizzing Walker asked: “So you definitely got the feeling that that was orchestrated by Hunter Biden to have like an appearance by his dad at that meeting just to kind of bolster your chances at making a deal work out?”
“Sure,” Walker reportedly said.
“Any times when he was in office? Or did you hear Hunter Biden say that he was setting up a meeting with his dad with them while dad was still in office?”
“Yes,” Walker replied again.
“And, inexplicably, the FBI agent changed the subject,” Shapley recalled.
The whistleblowers told Ways and Means Committee members that their team pressed for felony charges against Hunter Biden for ducking $2.2 million in back taxes, but were ignored by federal prosecutors.
They also said the Department of Justice refused to let Weiss file tax charges against the first son in the District of Columbia and Southern California — going against sworn testimony by Attorney General Merrick Garland that the US attorney had “full authority” to do so.
Ways and Means Chairman Jason Smith (R-Mo.) said Thursday that the whistleblowers’ testimony also showed Hunter’s deals came from “Ukraine, Romania and China totaling $17.3 million from 2014 to 2019,” with the first son having “personally received $8.3 million.”
Hunter pleaded guilty Tuesday for having twice failed to pay taxes on roughly $3 million he earned over 2017 and 2018. He has also agreed to a pretrial diversion program to dodge a felony gun conviction for purchasing a firearm while addicted to crack cocaine.
This story was updated June 26, 2023 to reflect additional reporting that indicates Hunter Biden was contacting CEFC translator Raymond Zhao. An earlier version of this story cited Shapley’s testimony that Hunter was texting Henry Zhao, who serves as the chairman of Harvest Fund Management and partnered on a separate deal with the first son’s firm BHR Partners.
