Washington Post Reinvents Its Biden Family Corruption Standard To Cover For The ‘Big Guy’
The Washington Post established itself as the premier public relations partner for the Biden family this weekend in a laughable article that purported to summarize its “review” of Hunter Biden’s career. The left-leaning outlet’s “reporting,” however, instead peddled to Americans a mythical tale that not only moved the goalposts for judging misconduct but whitewashed the entire field of the family’s influence-peddling scheme — details of which now confirm President Biden personally profited from the corruption.
“I have never discussed, with my son or my brother or with anyone else, anything having to do with their businesses. Period,” then-presidential candidate Joe Biden proclaimed in an August 2019 statement to reporters. Since then, overwhelming evidence has established Biden, while vice president, not only spoke with Hunter and Jim Biden about their business, but also met or talked with various investors including foreign officials, and later received money that originated from those same “business” partners.
Yet, on Saturday, the legacy outlet sidestepped the vast and still-accumulating evidence of the Biden pay-to-play scandal that now reaches all the way to the president. Instead, the weekend article headlined, “Hunter Biden’s Career of Benefiting From His Father’s Name,” declared that “a Washington Post review of Hunter Biden’s career found no sign the family patriarch was an active participant in his son’s business efforts.”
In four short years, we’ve gone from Biden declaring he never discussed with anyone “anything having to do with [Hunter and Jim’s] businesses,” to a supposed standard-bearer of journalism reframing the issue as whether the now-president had been “an active participant in his son’s business efforts.”
The bait-and-switch executed by The Washington Post proves vital to President Biden’s political survival because we are long past the question of whether he knew about Hunter and Jim’s business dealings, spoke to them about their activities, or met any of their investors — all things the family patriarch once denied.
We are also much beyond the question of whether Hunter Biden received money from China or whether Joe Biden financially benefited from his family members’ selling of influence. House oversight committees have established that the answer to both questions is an affirmative — again something Joe Biden at one time denied.
While the House still has numerous investigative leads to follow, extensive evidence confirms Joe Biden passively participated in Hunter’s “business” activities and also personally profited from Hunter and Jim Biden’s influence peddling. Under the most innocent reading of the evidence, Hunter and Jim were selling the “Biden brand” and access to the then-vice president.
The evidence also supports a more damning reality, namely that in exchange for bribes paid to his son’s businesses, Joe Biden did favors for foreigners. Specifically, evidence indicates that the Ukrainian energy company Burisma paid millions to Hunter Biden and Joe Biden in exchange for the then-vice president forcing Ukraine to fire its prosecutor general who was investigating Burisma. Evidence further suggests that the wife of the former mayor of Moscow paid Hunter Biden millions, and in exchange, now-President Biden kept her off the list of Russians sanctioned by the United States.
But even if the evidence is, as of yet, inconclusive concerning whether Joe Biden took bribes in exchange for altering U.S. policy, the evidence is overwhelming that the now-president passively helped his family sell the “Biden brand” by meeting or speaking with the investors who paid Hunter for the brand and access to the then-vice president. For instance, there was the April 16, 2015, dinner Hunter Biden and his then-business partner, Devon Archer, hosted at Café Milano, attended by both Burisma executive Vadym Pozharskyi and Joe Biden. Then, following Burisma’s Dec. 4, 2015, board meeting, Burisma founder Mykola Zlochevsky and Pozharskyi expressed concern to the son of the then-vice president over pressure they were facing from Ukrainian investigators. Hunter again provided an assist to Burisma, calling his father.
House investigators detailed numerous other meetings or communications between Joe Biden and foreigners Hunter was courting, such as the February 2014 dinner the then-vice president had with Russian and Kazakh oligarchs who funneled millions of dollars to Hunter Biden and his business associates. Joe Biden, while vice president, also joined one of Hunter’s Chinese business associations for coffee and later penned a college recommendation letter for the Chinese man’s daughter.
Additionally, the House revealed a reported meeting in February 2014 between then-Vice President Biden and two of Hunter’s Mexican business associates at the White House. Hunter Biden also reportedly arranged a video call with his father and Mexican business partners in October of 2015. The next month, Biden hosted Mexican business partners at the vice president’s official residence.
Those meetings and calls, however, only involved “general niceties” and discussions “about the weather,” The Washington Post stressed in its Saturday article. But that was all that was required of Joe Biden: The then-vice president merely needed to show Hunter’s investors that his son could provide the promised access. And the evidence establishes Joe Biden did just that, which is why The Washington Post on Saturday framed the question of concern as whether the president had been “an active participant in his son’s business efforts.”
Joe Biden, however, had no need to be an “active” participant in Hunter’s shakedowns to allow the scheme to succeed. Rather, by merely showing up or answering Hunter’s calls, Joe Biden provided Hunter the ability to represent to “investors” that his father stood at the ready to do his son’s bidding.
Such was the case when Hunter Biden texted executives connected to the Chinese energy company CEFC saying, “I am sitting here with my father and we would like to understand why the commitment made has not been fulfilled,” the “commitment” being an investment of millions in Biden-connected businesses. Hunter further threatened that “the man sitting next to me and every person he knows” would punish the Chinese businessmen if they didn’t abide by their agreement.
While much has been made of whether Joe Biden was actually sitting next to Hunter when the latter threatened the CEFC-connected individuals, it really doesn’t matter because Joe Biden had previously conveyed to the Chinese that Hunter had access to him. Whether Joe Biden sat passively at Hunter’s side or was quietly reposed elsewhere is irrelevant. Joe Biden had already given the Chinese every reason to believe Hunter’s claims — and apparently they did, because within “10 days of that conversation, a CEFC subsidiary poured roughly $5 million into a Biden-linked bank account.”
President Biden’s complicity wasn’t limited to him passively helping his son shake down foreign investors, however. Rather, House investigators have recently obtained bank records showing that from the CEFC Chinese “investment,” some $40,000 was funneled to Joe Biden, which is exactly 10 percent of the $400,000 Hunter Biden personally pulled from the CEFC investment — an interesting data point given the email notation indicating Hunter would hold 10 percent of the money “earned” from CEFC for the “Big Guy.”
Beyond the Post’s pathetic efforts to extricate Joe Biden from the corruption scandal, reporter Matt Viser attempted to minimize Hunter Biden’s conduct in his Saturday puff piece by portraying the president’s son as exceedingly ethical until addled by a drug addiction. None of that is particularly surprising though, as Viser has a history of soft-peddling lies for the Big Guy, while branding Republicans with the “racist” slur.
Surprising or not, The Washington Post’s weekend apologetics for the Biden clan shows the corporate press realizes precisely how damaging the evidence is.
Margot Cleveland is an investigative journalist and legal analyst and serves as The Federalist’s senior legal correspondent. Margot’s work has been published at The Wall Street Journal, The American Spectator, the New Criterion (forthcoming), National Review Online, Townhall.com, the Daily Signal, USA Today, and the Detroit Free Press. She is also a regular guest on nationally syndicated radio programs and on Fox News, Fox Business, and Newsmax. Cleveland is a lawyer and a graduate of the Notre Dame Law School, where she earned the Hoynes Prive—the law school’s highest honor. She later served for nearly 25 years as a permanent law clerk for a federal appellate judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Cleveland is a former full-time university faculty member and now teaches as an adjunct from time to time. Cleveland is also of counsel for the New Civil Liberties Alliance. Cleveland is on Twitter at @ProfMJCleveland where you can read more about her greatest accomplishments—her dear husband and dear son. The views expressed here are those of Cleveland in her private capacity.
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