WASHINGTON: Hunter Biden, the son of US President Joe Biden, has reached an agreement with the Justice Department to plead guilty to two charges of willfully failing to pay income taxes, as revealed in court documents on Tuesday.
The federal charges against Hunter Biden emerged from an investigation conducted by David Weiss, the US attorney in Delaware, the home state of President Biden, who was appointed by former President Donald Trump, a Republican.
Under the agreement, Biden has also entered into a pretrial diversion agreement regarding one firearm offense.
For years, Hunter Biden, 53, has faced relentless attacks from Trump and his Republican allies, who have accused him of various wrongdoings concerning Ukraine, China, and other matters. Hunter Biden has had a diverse professional career as a lobbyist, lawyer, investment banker, and artist. He has been open about his struggles with substance abuse.
In December 2020, Hunter Biden disclosed that Weiss’s office was investigating his tax affairs but denied any wrongdoing.
In his 2021 memoir, he discussed his battles with substance abuse, including his use of crack cocaine and struggles with alcoholism. In 2014, he was discharged from the US Navy reserve after testing positive for cocaine, according to sources at the time.
The Weiss inquiry initially focused on potential violations of tax and money laundering laws related to foreign business dealings, primarily in China, according to sources cited by Reuters. The investigation, led by Weiss, reportedly began as early as 2018, as per US media reports.
In 2022, a senior Republican congressman, James Comer, accused the US Treasury Department of withholding financial “suspicious activity reports” to protect Hunter Biden’s business dealings.
President Biden has two surviving children, Hunter Biden and daughter Ashley Biden. His son Beau Biden died in 2015 from cancer, and his daughter Naomi Biden died as an infant in a car accident that also claimed the life of Joe Biden’s first wife.
According to Aaron Crawford, a presidential history expert at the University of Tennessee, Hunter Biden appears to be the first child of a sitting president to face indictment. Crawford noted that the families of several presidents have been embroiled in scandals, citing examples such as Neil Bush, son of George H.W. Bush, who was involved in a failed savings and loan, and Don Nixon, brother of Richard Nixon, who was rescued from business failures by wealthy businessman Howard Hughes.
