Joe Biden May Have Committed Crime With No Interest Loan: Comer

James Comer suggested President Joe Biden may have committed a crime by lending his son money.

The Kentucky Republican representative chairs the House Oversight Committee impeachment probe into Biden, which opened after Republicans alleged they had evidence that he intervened in and benefited from his son Hunter Biden's business dealings with China and Ukraine while he served as vice president under Barack Obama, and includes accusations of taking bribes. The White House and Hunter Biden's lawyers have denied these allegations.

Comer said in a press release on Monday that Republicans had discovered evidence of direct payments from one of Hunter Biden's businesses to his father and alleged this was proof he directly benefited from his son's business operations.

A redacted document attached indicated that in September 2018, the president's son's law firm, Owasco PC, which had received payments from Chinese-state-linked companies and other foreign companies in the past, set up a recurring transfer to his father for $1,380 per month. Comer said in a statement that Hunter Biden's attorney said he was paying his father back for a truck the president had helped him buy when he was struggling financially.

Speaking in a series of media interviews on Monday, the Republican implied this was evidence of criminal activity.

He told Newsmax: "You can loan people money. If they pay you back, then you benefitted directly."

Meanwhile in an interview with Fox News, he said: "The reason why want to depose Hunter Biden is we want to say 'what did you do to receive this income?'

"If it was in fact lobbying, if he was a lobbyist for China, that's called a foreign agent and he's an unregistered foreign agent and that's a penalty of up to five years imprisonment and $250,000 fine and Joe Biden was receiving direct benefit from his son being an unregistered foreign agent so you could make a strong argument that Joe Biden violated the FARA (Foreign Agents Registration Act) laws as well."

FARA laws require certain foreign agents who are engaged in political activities to make these actions public.

Newsweek has contacted representatives for Joe Biden and Comer to comment on this story.

GOP members on the House Oversight Committee have been investigating the Biden family for over 10 months, but are yet to uncover evidence of Biden being directly involved with his son's business dealings.

Last month, the House Oversight Committee said it had obtained financial records that showed Biden family members allegedly set up more than 20 shell companies during Biden's vice presidency in order to hide payments they received from overseas.

The committee also said the Biden family, its associates, and its companies had received more than $24 million from foreign nations, including some viewed as U.S. adversaries.

Once the impeachment inquiry is complete, the Judiciary Committee will decide on whether to draw up any draft impeachment articles against Biden to be voted on by the House. Comer has said that a vote could take place by early 2024.

But given the Republican Party has a narrow majority in the House, there would need to be near-unanimous Republican support to reach the 218 vote threshold. No House Democrat is expected to support the move.

Responding to Comer's latest line of attack, Hunter Biden's attorney, Abbe Lowell, said in a statement: "There Chairman Comer goes again - reheating what is old as new to try to revive his sham of an investigation.

"The truth is Hunter's father helped him when he was struggling financially due to his addiction and could not secure credit to finance a truck. When Hunter was able to, he paid his father back and took over the payments himself."

In response, an Oversight Committee spokesperson said: "There is now a pattern of members of the Biden family using their bank accounts that have been funded by Chinese and other foreign entities to send money to Joe Biden.

"Based on witness testimony, Joe Biden knew and participated in his family's influence peddling schemes. The checks and payments we've uncovered reveal Joe Biden benefited from them."