President Joe Biden met with the chairman of a Chinese government linked energy firm that later wired millions of dollars to Hunter Biden and his business partners, an ex-associate of the Biden family testified to congressional investigators.
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The House Oversight and Judiciary Committees on Tuesday released the transcript of their closed-door interview with former Biden family associate Rob Walker as part of the House impeachment inquiry against President Biden.
That inquiry is examining whether Biden inappropriately engaged in business dealings with foreign companies, including companies linked to adversarial foreign governments.
Walker told congressional investigators that Joe Biden, along with his son Hunter Biden and other business associates, attended a meeting in a private room at the Four Seasons in Washington, D.C. with the chairman and other officials of the Chinese energy company CEFC.
Present at the meeting was CEFC chairman Ye Jianming, several CEFC officials, Hunter Biden, and another Biden associate James Gilliar, Walker said.
“I don’t remember the exact time, but I remember being in Washington, D.C., and the former Vice President stopped by. We were having lunch,” Walker said in the interview.
Walker said he did not know the exact time the lunch meeting took place, but said it was “it was 20- probably -17 at some point,” after Biden had finished his term as vice president.
“The meeting was probably an hour and a half,” Walker said, adding that then-private citizen Joe Biden was not there for the entire meeting.
āThe former vice president was not there the entire time. He was there maybe 10 minutes,ā Walker said. āHe spoke nice, you know, normal pleasantries. I think he probably did most of the talking and then left.ā
The purpose of the lunch with the CEFC officials was to discuss “ways we could work together,” Walker said.
“I don’t think we had structured a deal on how to work together at this point,” he said.
The Biden family associate told congressional investigators that the meeting likely occurred before his Robinson Walker LLC received a $3 million payment from a CEFC-linked entity on March 1, 2017.
The $3 million was disbursed in incremental payments in the following months from Walker’s account to various Biden family accounts, including to Hallie Biden and James Biden, who were not involved in the CEFC deal.
The payments to the Bidens from the CEFC deal totaled around $1,065,000, Walker said.
According to Walker, Hunter Biden and his associates’ began pursuing business with CEFC in February 2016, when Joe Biden was still vice president to Barack Obama, but that they did not receive payment from the Chinese company until after Joe Biden had left office.
Hunter Biden “had an interesting last name that would probably get people in the door,” Walker told congressional investigators when asked why the associates used the vice president’s son’s letterhead on a March 2016 letter drafted to a CEFC official.
“It had just seemed — if a U.S. entity was going to have a foreign national represent them, it would probably make more sense to come from Hunter versus me,” Walker said.
“Because he’s the son of the Vice President at the time, correct?” Congressional investigators asked Walker.
“He is the son of a Vice President at the time, yes,” Walker said.
“So it made more sense to get this business deal to put him as the front-facing person, right?” Walker was asked.
“Yes,” Walker replied.
Walker told investigators that he was not surprised at the former vice president’s appearance at the D.C. luncheon with the Chinese businessmen, and affirmed that Joe Biden would stop by “from time to time” in social settings.
The Biden family associate said that “it’s quite possible” that Joe Biden’s appearance at the meeting impressed the CEFC officials.
Hunter Biden is set to appear for a closed-door interview before the House Oversight and Judiciary Committees on Feb. 28, after being threatened by House Republicans with contempt of Congress resolutions for not complying with subpoenas.
It’s called ‘closing the sale.’. The service Hunter sells is access to corrupt old Joe. Old Joe is only too pleased to drop in. Just for 10 minutes, because he was sooooo busy.