House Oversight Committee chairman James Comer on Friday accused the Justice Department of trying to cover up the Biden family’s wrongdoings, after Attorney General Merrick Garland announced he would appoint U.S. attorney David Weiss as a special counsel to investigate Hunter Biden.
“This move by Attorney General Garland is part of the Justice Department’s efforts to attempt a Biden family coverup in light of the House Oversight Committee’s mounting evidence of President Joe Biden’s role in his family’s schemes selling ‘the brand’ for millions of dollars to foreign nationals,” Comer said in a statement. “The Justice Department’s misconduct and politicization in the Biden criminal investigation already allowed the statute of limitations to run with respect to egregious felonies committed by Hunter Biden.”
Garland’s announcement on Friday allows Weiss to continue his investigation into the president’s son free from the conventional DOJ oversight. The attorney general said Weiss requested special counsel authority on Tuesday.
Garland said he chose to grant the request “after consideration” and that Weiss will continue to oversee the “ongoing investigation” of Hunter as well as “any other matters that arose or may arise from that investigation.”
The appointment “reinforces for the American people the department’s commitment to both independence and accountability in particularly sensitive matters,” Garland said.
Weiss insisted last month that he had “ultimate authority” over the Hunter Biden probe, despite IRS whistleblower allegations that the IRS, DOJ, and FBI interfered with the investigation.
The two IRS whistleblowers told the House Ways and Means Committee they pushed for felony charges against Hunter Biden in the tax probe and that Weiss wanted to bring charges against the younger Biden in the District of Columbia and Southern California last year but was denied by DOJ officials both times.
Weiss also asked to be appointed special counsel in the case on several occasions, including in spring 2022, but those requests were also rebuffed by the DOJ, according to the whistleblowers’ testimony.
Comer went on to say DOJ officials “refused to follow evidence that could have led to Joe Biden, tipped off the Biden transition team and Hunter Biden’s lawyers about planned interviews and searches, and attempted to sneakily place Hunter Biden on the path to a sweetheart plea deal.”
Weiss’s appointment as special counsel comes weeks after that “sweetheart plea deal” fell through. Under the deal, Hunter would have plead guilty to misdemeanor tax charges and submit to a diversion agreement related to a felony gun charge in exchange for broad immunity from future charges related to foreign influence peddling. But Judge Maryellen Noreika challenged the terms of the deal, calling such a broad immunity deal unprecedented.
Just before Garland made his statement on Friday, prosecutors said in a court filing that the revised deal had fallen through and that they expect the case to go to trial.
Meanwhile, Comer accused the DOJ of “trying to stonewall congressional oversight as we have presented evidence to the American people about the Biden family’s corruption.”
Weiss’s appointment as special counsel will shield him from being forced to testify before the Oversight Committee. It comes days after Comer announced that the committee had uncovered bank records indicating that Hunter received a total of $20 million in payments from oligarchs in Russia, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine while his father was vice president.
Those payments included $3.5 million sent from Russian billionaire Yelena Baturina to the shell company Rosemont Seneca Thornton in February 2014. Roughly $1 million was transferred to Hunter’s business partner Devon Archer, while the rest was used to fund a new account Rosemont Seneca Bohai, which was used by both Archer and Hunter to receive other foreign wires.
After Baturina sent the massive sum to Rosemont Seneca Thornton, then–vice president Biden attended dinner with Baturina, Archer, Hunter, and others at Cafe Milano in Washington, D.C.
Then–vice president Biden also attended dinners with Hunter Biden; Archer; Baturina; Burisma executives; and Kenes Rakishev, a Kazakhstani oligarch, in the spring of 2014 and 2015 at Cafe Milano.
Comer on Friday vowed to continue the committee’s investigation into the Bidens.
Meanwhile, the Trump campaign reacted to the special counsel appointment in a statement on Friday: “Crooked Joe Biden, Hunter Biden, and the entire Biden Crime Family have been protected by the Justice Department for decades even though there is overwhelming evidence and credible testimony detailing their wrongdoing of lying to the American people and selling out the country to foreign enemies for the Biden Cartel’s own financial gain.”
“If this special counsel is truly independent — even though he failed to bring proper charges after a four year investigation and he appears to be trying to move the case to a more Democrat-friendly venue — he will quickly conclude that Joe Biden, his troubled son Hunter, and their enablers, including the media, which colluded with the 51 intelligence officials who knowingly misled the public about Hunter’s laptop, should face the required consequences,” a Trump spokesperson added.