Democrats accuse House GOP of ‘weaponizing’ resources to go after Hunter and Biden family corruption probes and point finger at suspect timing to ‘distract’ from Trump’s legal woes

Democrats on Wednesday accused Republicans of deliberately timing the release of evidence in their Hunter Biden investigation to distract from the fourth indictment against Donald Trump.

A newly circulated memo from the Democratic Oversight Committee staff calls on Republicans to release the transcripts of their interview with an FBI agent on the same day former President Trump was due to face charges in Georgia.

The document, used to provide Democratic committee members with updates and message points, is the same claim Republicans are making in reverse: GOP committee members say that every time there is new damaging news about Hunter Biden, Trump is indicted.

Top Oversight Democrat Jamie Raskin had hammered Chairman James Comer for taking four weeks to release the transcript of an interview with a former FBI Supervisory Special Agent (SSA) that they say undermined the GOP narrative.

The memo specifically calls on Republicans to release the transcripts of their interview with an FBI agent on the same day former President Trump was due to face charges in Georgia.

Now they are accusing Comer of holding onto the transcript and not dropping it until Monday — the day Trump was indicted for the fourth time — this time in the Georgia election case. They also called out the chairman for giving the transcript to Fox News before it was made public.

“The SSA’s statements during this interview clearly refuted the Republicans’ claims of political interference in the DOJ’s investigation and prosecution of Hunter Biden,” read the letter from Democratic staffers to Democratic members.

“Despite multiple calls from Ranking Member Raskin for Chairman Comer to release the transcript publicly and allow the American people to draw their own conclusions based on all the facts, Chairman Comer waited four weeks to release the transcript and did so only after he provided it first. to Fox News.”

“The release of the SSA transcript on Monday is the latest installment in Congressional Republicans’ campaign to arm Congress and this committee to carry out former President Trump’s political orders.”

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis has sued the former president over charges related to his efforts to overturn Georgia’s 2020 election results.

The Democrats also note that Comer released the transcripts of the Devon Archer testimony on the same day Trump was indicted on federal charges related to the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.

The Democratic memo said both transcripts prove the Republicans’ investigation into Biden’s family business deals a “complete and utter failure,” accusing them of trying to “pick, distort and mischaracterize facts.”

The latest propaganda from “Democrats is another example of them acting as attorneys for the Biden family,” a House Oversight GOP spokesperson said in response. “The Oversight Committee’s investigation has produced concrete evidence through bank records and witness statements that Joe Biden was involved in his family’s corrupt influence schemes.”

The memo admits that Hunter Biden appears to have engaged in behavior common to lobbying and government relations in Washington — dealing in Washington surnames and connections, and, in Hunter Biden’s case, the “illusion of access” to his father .’

But they say the investigation has “repeatedly found that President Biden never took any official action in favor of Hunter Biden, his clients or his business associates.”

“This radical misuse of congressional resources by Republican congressmen to boost Mr. Trump’s election prospects is not a secret strategy.”

Monday’s newly released transcripts confirm the IRS whistleblower’s testimony that the FBI attempted to interview Hunter Biden as part of their investigation into his tax and gun crimes, but was never successful.

Years after the Hunter Biden investigation, which began in 2018, the FBI decided to interview their target. The interview was scheduled to take place on December 8, 2020 – weeks after the presidential election. The FBI agent said he understood that the Secret Service needed to be notified for security reasons, but said he intended to notify them of their “intent” to deal with Hunter at 8 a.m. the morning of the interview. to talk.

But the night before, the FBI agent learned that both the Secret Service and the Biden transition team had already been notified. “This essentially tipped off a group of people very close to President Biden and Hunter Biden and gave this group an opportunity to obstruct the approach of the witness.”

“I felt like they were people who didn’t need to know about our intentions,” he said. “I believe the Secret Service needed to be notified for our safety, for the lack of confusion, for de-conflicting, which we would in so many other cases, but I didn’t understand why the first report.”

The agent was then told to give his contact information to the Secret Service and not go to the house, but wait outside for a call that Hunter was ready for the interview. The officer said he never remembered being told to wait for a target to call and said they were ready for an interview.

The call never came and the agent had other interviews to conduct, so he left.

As for the Biden transition team, “I don’t know why that would have happened,” the agent said.

Democrats, led by leading member Jamie Raskin, had hammered Chairman James Comer for taking four weeks to release the transcript of an interview with a former FBI Supervisory Special Agent (SSA) that they say undermined the GOP narrative

“Despite multiple calls from Ranking Member Raskin (above) for Chairman Comer to release the transcript publicly and allow the American people to draw their own conclusions based on all the facts, Chairman Comer waited four weeks to release the transcript and did so only afterwards. to Fox News first,” the memo says

The unusual interview attempt took place under the Trump administration while U.S. attorney David Weiss in Delaware oversaw the Hunter Biden case. Weiss has since been appointed special counsel on the case, making him more independent from the main Justice Department.

When asked if he had “ever known U.S. Attorney David Weiss to make prosecuting decisions based on political influence,” the agent said “no.”

The Hunter Biden case remains ongoing after a plea deal spiraled out of control when the judge informed Hunter that pleading guilty to tax and gun crimes would not protect him from future charges, specifically failing to register as a foreign agent.

Meanwhile, the Archer testimony, which fell on the day of Trump’s arraignment, revealed that Joe Biden had spoken to Hunter’s business associates about 20 times over the course of 10 years. Archer did not claim to have ever heard Biden talk directly about business, but said having a father of the then vice president on the phone sold the idea of ​​access to foreign executives.