Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-Ga.) this week came out in support of appointing a special counsel to investigate the son of Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden.
“The Department of Justice MUST do the right thing. Appoint a special counsel on Hunter Biden NOW!” Loeffler wrote in a tweet.
Top Republicans, including President Donald Trump and Senate Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), want the attorney general to task a special counsel with probing Hunter Biden.
Hunter Biden is under investigation by the U.S. Attorney’s office in Delaware, but there are fears that if his father wins the White House, the probe will be interfered with. A special counsel would alleviate those fears, but not extinguish them.
Joe Biden’s team and an adviser, Sen. Chris Coons (D-Conn.), have said he would not interfere with the investigation into his son.
The probe centers on “tax affairs,” Hunter Biden said in a statement earlier this month released by his father’s campaign. The investigation reportedly includes looking at the younger Biden’s dealings with China.
Hunter Biden conducted business in China, Ukraine, and elsewhere while his father was vice president from 2009 to 2017. Hunter Biden had numerous ties to people linked to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and Moscow, an oversight report showed last month.
Former Attorney General William Barr, who was still in place until Christmas, said on Monday that he didn’t plan on appointing a special counsel to investigate Hunter Biden.
“To the extent that there’s an investigation, I think that it’s being handled responsibly and professionally currently within the department, and to this point I have not seen a reason to appoint a special counsel and I have no plan to do so before I leave,” Barr said at an unrelated press conference.
Graham pushed back, writing on Twitter that his concern “is the scope of the Delaware investigation is limited to tax fraud and will not be a thorough review of Hunter Biden’s extensive business dealings with foreign nations.”
“The question for the country is: to what extent did Hunter Biden and his family have problematic business dealings with China, Russia, and other nations which could impact the Biden administration’s foreign policy?” he added.
The attorney general position is now held by Jeffrey Rosen, who hasn’t addressed the matter.
Jonathan Turley, a law professor at George Washington University Law School, wrote in an op-ed Saturday that the case for appointing a special counsel includes the “clear conflicts” that are present for Joe Biden.
“In addition, Biden has stated repeatedly for more than a year that ‘no one has suggested my son did anything wrong.’ That clearly is not true; many people agree that Hunter Biden was engaged in raw influence-peddling on a global scale. That may not be a crime but it certainly is ethically wrong,” Turley wrote.
On the other hand, the case against appointing a special counsel rests on whether the current U.S. Attorney of Delaware is kept in his position; most new administrations fire U.S. attorneys.
“The biggest issue is that influence-peddling is legal. It is the favorite form of corruption in Washington. While you cannot give a politician like Biden an envelope of money, you can give his son or other relatives millions in dubious contracts, gifts, and loans,” he concluded. “The special counsel regulations involve ‘an investigation or prosecution’ only into criminal acts. The Justice Department does not investigate politicians’ unethical conduct or simple lying. Otherwise, it would have little time to do anything else.”
From The Epoch Times
