Former Hunter Biden business partner Devon Archer told Congress Monday that Hunter referred to President Biden as “my guy” while connecting his dad to foreign associates nearly two dozen times — as Republicans move closer to starting an impeachment inquiry.
Archer said during a four-hour House Oversight Committee interview that Ukrainian natural gas company Burisma Holdings paid Hunter up to $1 million per year to serve on its board because of his family’s “brand.”
Archer met with then-Vice President Joe Biden in April 2014, within days of joining Burisma’s board alongside Hunter, and told lawmakers that “Burisma would have gone out of business if ‘the brand’ had not been attached to it,” according to a readout from panel Republicans.
“Archer talked about the ‘big guy’ and how Hunter Biden always said, ‘We need to talk to my guy,’ ‘We need to see when my guy is going to be here,’ and those types of things,” Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) told reporters as he left the deposition.
According to Archer, Burisma owner Mykola Zlochevsky — who allegedly told an FBI informant in 2016 he was “coerced” to pay $10 million in bribes to Hunter and Joe Biden — put intense pressure on Hunter in late 2015 to enlist US support for ousting Ukrainian prosecutor-general Viktor Shokin, who had investigated Burisma, the Republican readout said.
At one point, Hunter Biden, Zlochevsky and Burisma executive Vadym Pozharskyi stepped away and “called DC” about the issue, Archer said.
“This raises concerns that Hunter Biden was in violation of the Foreign Agents Registration Act,” the GOP majority on the Oversight Committee tweeted.
Archer also said Hunter Biden, whose probation-only plea deal for tax fraud linked to his foreign income and an unrelated gun charge collapsed last week, put his father on speakerphone more than 20 times during business meetings to promote “the brand.”
Joe Biden was on speakerphone during a Paris dinner with reps from a French energy company, Archer said, and while his son was in China with Jonathan Li of BHR Partners, a state-backed investment fund co-founded by Hunter in 2013 — after he introduced his father to Li during an official trip to Beijing.
Archer further confirmed that then-Vice President Biden attended an April 2015 dinner at Washington’s Cafe Milano with Pozharskyi and former Moscow first lady Yelena Baturina, as previously reported by The Post.
It was not immediately clear whether Archer shared significant details about the bribery accusation involving Burisma or addressed other lingering points of intrigue, such as the extent of the business relationship between Hunter and Baturina, or the ties between the first son and another Russian billionaire, former arms contractor Vladimir Yevtushenkov.
“[Archer] said, ‘I do not recall’ more times than I [would like],” Oversight Committee member Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) told The Post Monday evening.
“We wish he could have given us more detailed answers on some of our questions. But what he did provide is massive,” she added. “He provided, as a former business partner of Hunter Biden, that Joe Biden lied to the American people so many times. Joe Biden is on record over and over — on video and interviews — saying, ‘I don’t know anything about my son’s business dealings. I’ve never talked to Hunter about his business.’”
Source : https://nypost.com/2023/07/31/ex-hunter-biden-partner-devon-archer-arrives-for-house-deposition