Kevin McCarthy Has Plan for Hunter Biden's Plea Deal

A plea deal agreed to by Hunter Biden, son of President Joe Biden, and prosecutors will provide further impetus for House Republicans to get to the bottom of other ongoing investigations involving the president's embattled son and the family, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said Tuesday.

Hunter Biden's attorneys reached the deal after the Department of Justice (DOJ) charged him with failure to pay federal income tax and illegally possessing a weapon. As part of the deal, he will reportedly plead guilty to misdemeanor tax offenses while avoiding prosecution on illegal gun charges by adhering to certain provisions based on his history of addiction and substance abuse.

The deal comes after years of Hunter Biden being questioned about his business dealings in Ukraine in association with the private gas company Burisma, in addition to the Biden family being accused of receiving millions of dollars from Chinese companies as part of peddling foreign influence.

"It continues to show a two-tiered system in America," McCarthy told reporters Tuesday. "If you are the president's leading political opponent [Donald Trump], the DOJ tries to literally put you in jail and give you prison. If you are the president's son, you get a sweetheart deal.

"Now, this does nothing to our investigation. It actually should enhance our investigation because the DOJ should not be able to withhold any information now, saying that it is pending investigation. They should be able to provide [Republican House Oversight Committee] Chairman [James] Comer with any information that he requires."

Comer, in a statement on behalf of the committee, referred to Hunter Biden's plea deal as "a slap on the wrist," citing purported uncovered evidence that "reveals the Bidens engaged in a pattern of corruption, influence peddling, and possible bribery."

He vowed that investigations into the Biden family "will not rest" until the family members' involvement in the "schemes" is revealed.

Comer, however, and Republican Senator Chuck Grassley have sowed doubt regarding sources and evidence against Hunter Biden and the Biden family, including more than a dozen audiotapes allegedly possessed by a foreign national whom Republicans believe can corroborate Hunter Biden's association with Burisma.

Robert Hockett, a law and finance professor at Cornell University, told Newsweek that pleading down tax charges to misdemeanors is not uncommon, no matter the party committing the offense, "especially if they're going through a problematic period of time because of an addiction to some form of substance abuse."

He said the gun aspect is part of the same legal vein, that prosecutors tend to look at the offense as "somewhat mitigated or somewhat lesser, owing to the fact that the behavior itself is attributable in part to the person's being substance addicted."

Hockett also noted that Trump-appointed U.S. Attorney David Weiss of Delaware has overseen the investigation that led to the plea deal.

Weiss was appointed in February 2018 and is a member of the Delaware and Pennsylvania bars, according to his DOJ biography. CNN reported that during the time Weiss was nominated and later confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Trump referred to him as one of nine candidates who shared his vision for "Making America Safe Again."

"This development reflects the Justice Department's continued institutional independence in following the evidence of actual crimes and enforcing the rule of law even in the face of constant criticism and heckling by my GOP colleagues who think that the system of justice should only follow their partisan wishes," Democratic Representative Jamie Raskin, ranking member of the House Oversight Committee, said in a statement.

"Oversight Committee Republicans have advanced debunked conspiracy theories about President Biden and are now, again, wailing about the work of a Trump-appointed U.S. Attorney."

McCarthy, when asked by reporters about Weiss overseeing the charges and his being appointed by Trump, responded by rhetorically asking if others in Hunter Biden's position who committed the same or similar crimes would receive "a difference in justice."

The investigation into Hunter Biden is "ongoing" per Weiss' office, according to CNN's Annie Grayer.

"It doesn't surprise me that some Republicans in Congress are sort of trying to paint this as a sweetheart deal for Hunter Biden," Hockett said, "but what they're leaving out again is that the nature of the offenses that are accused is just much less serious and much more common....My guess is that Donald Trump would actually get a much better deal if he were to plead guilty, too, but of course he's not as he's trying to get the court of public opinion to sort of delegitim[ize] the court process [following his indictment on 37 counts for allegedly mishandling classified documents].

"That's just gonna get bigger and bigger [for Trump], of course, while the Hunter Biden thing, I think, will go away precisely because he's done the thing that most people do—which is to plead guilty and thereby get a lesser penalty than what otherwise happened."