The Biden family “influence peddling scheme” raked in at least $20 million from 23 countries on four continents via 20 shell companies, the House Ways and Means Committee stated based on new disclosures from IRS whistleblowers.
“The newly released information shows that, in addition to China, Russia, and Ukraine, the Biden family influence peddling scheme was a vast global operation with ties to at least 23 countries and likely more,” the committee said Thursday.
“Additionally, the documentation suggests a deliberate attempt by the Biden family to evade taxes and shield visibility into how more than $20 million flowed from foreign sources by funneling it through more than 20 shell companies and LLCs,” the committee added.
Source: House Ways and Means Committee
Since January, House investigators uncovered that the Biden business created more than 20 shell companies, raked in more than $24 million from foreign countries, and identified a total of nine Biden family members who received money from the organization.
“The evidence today shows the complexity and scale of the Biden family influence peddling scheme. Millions of dollars were flowing through subsidiaries and LLCs to avoid taxes and shield visibility into how the money from foreign sources,” Ways and Means Committee Chair Jason Smith (R-MO) said in a statement.
House Republicans are investigating if President Joe Biden directly profited from his family’s ventures, even though monetary benefits to Biden family members are benefits to Joe Biden and, therefore, implicate him in wrongdoing, legal scholar Jonathan Turley argued before Congress in September.
WATCH — Jonathan Turley: Evidence Supports Impeachment Inquiry
House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer (R-KY) subpoenaed Hunter and James Biden in September to obtain their personal and business bank records, which could further link Joe Biden to his family’s foreign deals.
Comer’s subpoenas appear directed towards obtaining records linked to Joe Biden’s corporation, “CelticCapri Corp,” which received nearly $10 million in 2017 without specifying revenue line items. “So that’s an LLC account. It wasn’t a shell company — that was a real LLC account with more earnings in there than what we can find. So that is an account we plan to subpoena as we follow the money,” Comer said in September.
Questions remain about how then-Vice President Joe Biden’s corporation received the $10 million in 2017, a year that corresponds with elaborate webs of wire transactions and Joe Biden’s departure from the White House. The year 2017 also encompasses the timeframe an FBI informant alleged Burisma Holdings bribed Joe Biden with $5 million.
“This is organized crime,” Comer said in September. “I could make the argument that there’s already enough evidence to point to Joe being the ringleader of this, not just knowing, not just lying about it, but being the ringleader.”
“You don’t create 20 shell companies. You don’t have this array of transfers between shells that the banks quite quickly identified as money laundering,” Comer argued. “You don’t have an associate, someone that you were in business with, to be part of the first wire transfer if you weren’t organized.”
Follow Wendell Husebø on Twitter @WendellHusebø. He is the author of Politics of Slave Morality.