Hunter Biden’s business activities have attracted attention before.
His work as a lobbyist when his father was in the U.S. Senate came under scrutiny. Shortly after his father became Barack Obama’s running mate in 2008, he gave up his lobbying career and resigned his partnership at a Washington lobbying firm.
When he had been senator, Mr. Obama sought more than $3.4 million in earmarks for clients of Hunter Biden, and succeeded in getting $192,000 for St. Xavier University near Chicago, according to public disclosure records.
At the time, a spokesman for Mr. Obama said Hunter Biden hadn’t met with the senator himself but rather with office staff. The spokesman also said it wasn’t surprising to see Mr. Obama was fighting for interests and institutions in his home state of Illinois.
In early 2009, The Wall Street Journal reported that Hunter Biden and his uncle had run a fund of funds that was being marketed exclusively by Texas financier R. Allen Stanford’s companies. Mr. Stanford later was sentenced to 110 years in prison for masterminding a $7 billion Ponzi scheme.
At the time of the Journal article, a lawyer for the Bidens said the fund terminated the relationship and offered to return $2.7 million in investment that companies controlled by Mr. Stanford had given the fund. He said the Bidens had never met Mr. Stanford.
Wow this guy's a real Sherlock Holmes. We should counter by asking how much the Kremlin is paying him to run this article.
Devon D. ArcherTeam – see below. Let’s think about some of the best ways to answer this and perhaps regroup on Monday. In the meantime we should look through the various investigative reports we have to determine the wisdom of sharing/what to share etc.
Ryan F. Toohey
From: Sonne, Paul [mailto:Paul.Sonne@wsj.com]
Sent: Friday, October 16, 2015 11:06 AM
To: Toohey, Ryan
Cc: Laura Mills
Subject: Follow-Up
Ryan,
Thanks for setting up the call and for your cooperation. We appreciate it. Here is a rundown of things outstanding:
1. Any more info on the licenses, including possibly the Kroll Report on them. I imagine this would be very helpful and go a long way toward answering questions 9-12.
2. This question (number 16) went unanswered for some reason, I think it was maybe lost in the shuffle: Geoffrey Pyatt, the U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine, recently mentioned the U.K. proceedings during a speech in Odessa. He said the following: “In the case of former Ecology Minister Mykola Zlochevsky, the U.K. authorities had seized 23 million dollars in illicit assets that belonged to the Ukrainian people. Officials at the [Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s] office were asked by the U.K to send documents supporting the seizure. Instead they sent letters to Zlochevsky’s attorneys attesting that there was no case against him. As a result the money was freed by the U.K. court and shortly thereafter the money was moved to Cyprus.” Do you have any response to this comment?
3. Here’s that question for Eric to be passed on to Hunter: Joe Biden has become the leading face of US foreign policy toward Ukraine, repeatedly coming to Kiev to drive home the message that the country must root out corruption to succeed. Many people in Ukraine, including apparently the US ambassador, see Mr. Zlochevsky’s dealings—namely, the receipt of lucrative oil and gas exploration licenses for his own companies while in top government posts—as indicative of the very sort of behavior the Vice President is demanding the country eradicate. Does Hunter feel that his involvement with Mr. Zlochevsky’s firm undermines his father’s message ? Why be involved with the company at all? Is it a question of needing money?
4. If you can clear up what Hunter transitioning to the Burisma Geothermal board from the main board means, that’d be helpful. Not sure why that is happening or if it’s actually significant in any informal sense.
5. Lastly, perhaps we can discuss the issue of what we’re going to say about Hunter’s compensation over the phone?
Thanks again for all your professionalism in dealing with this. We are grateful. Talk soon.
All the best,
Paul
--
Paul Sonne
The Wall Street Journal
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