As prosecutors weigh charges, memos show Hunter Biden was alerted to legal exposure years ago
Hunter Biden was told in 2016-17 he had unpaid taxes on foreign income, alerted to debate over registering as a FARA lobbyist.
As they decide whether to file criminal charges, federal prosecutors have access to key Hunter Biden memos that state the president's son was alerted years ago to legal issues about unpaid taxes on foreign income and the potential of having to register as a foreign lobbyist.
The memos from business associates, accountants and law partners were turned over in December 2019 to the FBI on a laptop that Hunter Biden had abandoned at a Delaware repair shop. They provide supporting evidence to suspicious financial transactions flagged to the Treasury Department between 2016 and 2019 by banks that were revealed by a 2020 Senate investigation.
Two of the most tantalizing memos involve Hunter Biden's relationship with Burisma Holdings, the Ukrainian gas firm long regarded as corrupt by U.S. officials that hired Hunter Biden and his now-convicted business partner Devon Archer to its board in spring 2014.
The hirings coincided with a trip then-Vice President Joe Biden made to Kyiv as President Obama's newly named point man for U.S.-Ukraine policy.
The computer records show that just as word of the Burisma hiring became public Hunter Biden was looped into an email string with Ukrainian company executives and one of his American law partners laying out an aggressive plan to lobby U.S. agencies. There was a pointed discussion about gaining influence inside the Obama-Biden administration for Burisma without having to register as a lobbyist under the Foreign Agent Registration Act.
"Devon and Hunter — The immediate plan is to reach out to the Energy and Ukraine desks, respectively, at State Dept to introduce them to Burisma and 'update' them on Burisma's current situation," the law partner at Boies Schiller & Flexner wrote.
"We can't just go in there with a hard ask but it is often the case that the conversation is open to an ask, assuming it goes well," the May 12, 2014 memo added. At the time Hunter Biden was joining the Burisma board, he also worked at the Boies Schiller law firm and was directing some of Burisma's legal work to the firm.
The memos openly discussed a desire to avoid registering as lobbyists.
"We at BSF will lead all this work and can execute the political and legal work right up to the line where we would need to register as lobbyists, but I don't want to register under the lobbying disclosure act or the foreign agents registration act," the law partner wrote.
Later, she inquired about whether Burisma had any American subsidiaries so it could lobby through them and not be viewed as a foreign entity.
https://justthenews.com/accountability/russia-and-ukraine-scandals/prosecutors-weigh-charges-memos-show-hunter-biden-was