Hunter Biden’s Attorneys Dispute Prosecutors’ Bombshell Accusations of Influence-Peddling Scheme with Romanian Client

Hunter Biden’s legal team is disputing the Justice Department’s recent description of an influence-peddling scheme involving a Romanian businessman and millions worth of payments.

The younger Biden’s attorneys filed court papers Sunday to support their motion to remove allegations of political corruption and influence from his upcoming tax trial — allegations federal prosecutors believe are relevant because they expect one of his former business partners to testify that Romanian oligarch Gabriel Popoviciu paid Biden and his associates to lobby the U.S. government on his behalf.

“While going through the motions of filing Business Associate 1’s grand jury transcript under seal in support of its response to the Motion, the government included an inflammatory and incomplete, and therefore misleading, characterization of that testimony in a public filing, surely knowing it would make news,” Biden’s attorneys said, noting the flurry of news articles on the court filing.

Federal prosecutors said they were expecting one of Biden’s business partners to testify about a business agreement designed to conceal the true nature of the work for Popoviciu, namely lobbying the U.S. government to influence the Romanian investigation into his suspected corruption. The business partner appears to be Rob Walker, whose holding company received roughly $3 million from Popoviciu from November 2015 to May 2017, according to bank records House Republicans released last year. All but one of the payments took place when Hunter’s father, Joe Biden, was vice president during the Obama administration.

The payments to Walker were mentioned in the sweeping indictment against Biden last year containing the nine federal tax charges he will stand trial for in September. He has pleaded not guilty to all the charges.

Hunter Biden allegedly failed to pay more than $1.4 million worth of taxes over a four-year period last decade, failed to file 2017 and 2018 tax returns on time, and filed false tax returns for 2018. During those years, Biden suffered from a crack-cocaine addiction and lived a lavish lifestyle defined by excessive partying and sexual deviance.

Walker distributed roughly one-third of the funds to Hunter Biden and a third to another business partner. Federal prosecutors believe Hunter Biden and his business partners lobbied officials from the State Department for Popoviciu, and that Walker crafted the deal to avoid registering under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA).

Prosecutors said the evidence matters for the tax case because it establishes some of the income Biden received over the relevant time frame, and demonstrates that he was not in a “diminished” mental state to the point where he could not file his taxes in a timely manner. Biden’s attorneys argued that the details of the Romanian business agreement are not relevant and whether he violated tax laws.

“Putting aside why such irrelevant and politically-charged material would be included in the filings, it has no place in a trial where the only issue in the years in which Mr. Biden’s business is at issue has nothing to do with any source of income and all as to whether his filings and payments willfully violated the law. The Court should not allow a side show in which issues far beyond the charges have to be explained and litigated in a tax case,” Biden’s attorneys added.

The Justice Department clarified in the court filing that it will not accuse Biden of violating FARA or making improper contacts with government officials, because the matters are outside the scope of the tax case.

House Republicans have investigated the Romanian business dealings as part of the impeachment inquiry into President Biden. They have also looked into Biden’s business dealings with individuals and entities in Ukraine, China, and elsewhere. The income he received from deals with Ukrainian energy company Burisma Holdings and Chinese conglomerate CEFC is expected to come up during the tax trial.

Special counsel David Weiss’ team of prosecutors is handling the tax case against Hunter Biden after they won a conviction against him on three federal gun charges in June.