Hunter Biden was receiving a $10 million annual fee from a Chinese billionaire who has been accused of corruption and with whom he sought to increase the cash flow with a joint business ownership, an August 2017 email from Mr. Biden shows.
The money was for “introductions alone,” said Mr. Biden, son of Democratic presidential nominee Joseph R. Biden. Another email to Hunter Biden from a consultant says that a 10% stake in an unnamed company will go to “the big guy?” The “big guy” was not identified.
Hunter Biden hooked up with the billionaire, Ye Jianming, chairman of the CEFC China Energy Co. conglomerate, during his father’s vice presidency.
The emails were first reported by The New York Post on Thursday.
The newspaper obtained a cache of messages, documents and photos from a MacBrook Pro laptop purportedly owned by Hunter Biden, via President Trump’s personal attorney, Rudolph W. Giuliani.
Democratic candidate Mr. Biden has denied any wrongdoing.
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His campaign said investigations into Mr. Biden and Hunter have “reached the same conclusion: that Joe Biden carried out official U.S. policy toward Ukraine and engaged in no wrongdoing.”
The New York Post stories have helped keep the allegations alive less than three weeks from Election Day.
Mr. Biden told donors Thursday that Mr. Trump is ratcheting up a “misinformation” campaign.
“We have 19 days left, and you know, he’s going to throw everything but the kitchen sink at me,” Mr. Biden said.
Mr. Giuliani, meanwhile, blasted out a screenshot Thursday of a text he claims Hunter Biden sent to his daughter, Naomi Biden, on Jan. 3, 2019.
“I Hope you all cal do what I did and pay for everything for this entire family Fro 30 years,” the text reads. “It’s really hard. But don’t worry unlike Pop I won’t make you give me half your salary.”
Mr. Giuliani said, “This describes the amount kicked back to the Boss, Joe Biden, as happens in every organized crime group.”
Mr. Giuliani also said Hunter Biden was “heavily inebriated” when he dropped off his laptop at a Delaware repair shop in April 2019.
The owner of the shop, John Paul Mac Isaac, claimed legal ownership since nobody picked it up, and he provided a download to the FBI and to Mr. Giuliani, who was conducting an investigation into Hunter Biden’s financial ties to an energy business in Ukraine.
The FBI and U.S. attorney in Delaware refused to comment on anything related to the laptop, including whether they were in possession of it, citing their policy of neither confirming nor denying the existence of an investigation.
A report by Senate Republicans issued last month said Hunter Biden “cashed in” on his father’s vice presidency. The report said the Biden-Ye business relationship intensified in 2015. Hunter Biden flew with his father, then the vice president, on Air Force 2 to China in 2013 and made business contacts there.
Mr. Ye, 43, who maintained close ties to the Chinese military and Communist Party, was accused by the government of corruption and vanished in 2018.
Hunter Biden’s 2017 email was sent to Gongwen Dong, a Ye confident who brokered his huge investment deals and dealt directly with Hunter Biden.
Hunter Biden laid out his expectations for more money from the “chairman” in the August 2017 message.
“My understanding is that the original agreement with the Director was for consulting fees based on introductions alone a rate of $10 million per year for for three years guarantee total of $30 million,” Hunter Biden wrote to Mr. Gongwen. “The chairman [Mr. Ye] changed that deal after we me[t] in Miami TO A MUCH MORE LASTING AND LUCRATIVE ARRANGEMENT to create a holding company 50% percent owned by ME and 50% owned by him. Consulting fees is one piece of our income stream but the reason this proposal by the chairman was so much more interesting to me and my family is that we would also be partners in the equity and profits of the JV [joint venture].”
Hunter Biden told Mr. Gongwen in the email that if the joint venture did not work, “then please return us to the original deal 10M per year a guaranteed 3 years plus bonus payments for any successful deal we introduce.”
The New York Post reproduced a second email Thursday showing an international consultant, James Gilliar, telling Hunter Biden in May 2017 about how Ye Jianming’s CEFC will divide up payments for an unnamed company for which Hunter is “chair/vice chair.”
The email says Hunter will receive a 20% equity, plus a 10% stake “held by H for the big guy?”
The email does not identify the “big guy.”
In a conference call organized by the Trump campaign, Rep. Jim Banks of Indiana said Hunter Biden is lucky not to be in jail, and said the former vice president has some answering to do.
“What we want to know today is Joe Biden the big guy?” Mr. Banks said. “When there is discussion of Hunter facilitation ‘introductions’ for $10 million who is he expected to introduce to whom? Are they talking about Joe Biden?”
The New York Post reported on Wednesday that a top executive at Ukraine’s Burisma Holdings energy company sent Hunter Biden an email thanking him for setting up a 2015 meeting with his father, then the vice president. That narrative flies in the face of the elder Biden’s claims that he had no knowledge of his son’s business deals.
President Barack Obama named Mr. Biden as the point man on Ukraine in February 2014. Three months later, Hunter Biden was added to the Burisma board and raked in millions of dollars in the ensuing years, the Senate report said.
The Biden campaign responded by saying there is no official record of such a meeting but that there could have been a brief encounter, Politico reported.
Hunter Biden’s attorney has not denied the emails’ authenticity.
Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Chairman Ron Johnson, Wisconsin Republican, said on Fox News that a “whistleblower” — apparently computer shop owner Mr. Isaac — has delivered data to the committee, which will be evaluated.
He and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Charles E. Grassley, Iowa Republican, issued a report on Hunter Biden’s far-flung financial ties during the Obama administration. Besides China and Ukraine, Mr. Biden received a $3.5 million wire transfer from a Russian woman oligarch in February 2014 for consulting services. He also received millions of dollars in payments from Burisma as a board member.
The Senate report details how Hunter Biden set up an LLC called Hudson West in April 2016 that became a receiving point for Chinese cash. Mr. Gongwen, Mr. Ye’s associate, played a role in setting up the firm.
In August 2017, the same month Hunter Biden was talking to Mr. Gongwen about his $10 million retainer, CEFC wired Hudson West $5 million. Hunter Biden sent $4.7 million to his law firm, the Senate report shows.
• Seth McLaughlin and Jeff Mordock contributed to this report.
• Rowan Scarborough can be reached at rscarborough@washingtontimes.com.
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