[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 211 (Monday, December 14, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Pages S7457-S7458]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                          Biden Investigation

  Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, for over a year, Senator Johnson and I 
investigated the Biden family's financial dealings. For over a year, 
the liberal media and my colleagues on the other side of the aisle 
falsely said that we were peddling Russian disinformation. They ginned 
up any story they could to falsely portray our investigation in an 
effort to delegitimize the report's findings. Even my colleague Senator 
Wyden, with whom I have worked on many bipartisan investigations, said 
the following:

       This disinformation also became the basis of the Johnson-
     Grassley investigation. The political nature of this 
     investigation has been clear all along. Bottom line: The 
     Johnson-Grassley investigation is baseless. It is laundering 
     Russian propaganda for circulation in the United States.

  It seems the liberal media and Democrats have a very nervous tick. 
Any time a Republican gets close to the truth and is about to serve 
justice, the other side yells: ``Russian disinformation.'' Of course, 
as we see now, that is a load of garbage.
  As I have said on this floor several times before, our report was 
rooted in information from U.S. Government agencies and a left-aligned 
U.S. lobby shop that represented a corrupt Ukrainian gas company, and 
by now, the American people know that it is really the Democrats and 
liberal media that are connected to Russian disinformation. Just think 
of the Steele dossier. It was infected with Russian disinformation and 
paid for by the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton's 
campaign.
  The liberal media and those on the other side of the aisle were 
scared of the facts. They were scared that the American people would 
see the Biden family's deep and extensive link to foreign governments, 
including the Communist Chinese Government.
  And once Senator Johnson and I released publically our findings, 
those same liberal outlets said the report repackaged old material and 
that there wasn't really anything new to it.

[[Page S7458]]

  They went into full Joe Biden protection mode, and they didn't even 
try to hide it.
  One Washington Post columnist said: ``Even after accepting 
disinformation from Russian agents, Johnson and Grassley couldn't come 
up with anything new or interesting on Hunter Biden.''
  Well, we know today the Post should be ashamed that they said that.
  POLITICO ran a story with this headline: ``GOP Senators' anti-Biden 
report repackages old claims.''
  And National Public Radio said about the New York Post Hunter Biden 
stories: ``We don't want to waste our time on stories that are not 
really stories, and we don't want to waste the listeners' and readers' 
time on stories that are just pure distractions,'' end of the NPR 
quote.
  Now, look at what Twitter and Facebook did to Hunter Biden news. 
Simply said, they interfered in the election and gave the Biden 
campaign a multimillion-dollar in-kind donation, courtesy of their 
blatant and unforgiveable censorship.
  So, my fellow Americans, let us never forget what Twitter and 
Facebook did during the 2020 elections.
  Now, let's fast forward to this very day. Now it is confirmed that 
Hunter Biden is under criminal investigation, reportedly for his taxes 
and financial dealings--the very fact pattern that we described in the 
Johnson-Grassley report.
  It shouldn't take Hunter Biden to confirm that he is under criminal 
investigation before the mainstream press gets permission--from whom, I 
don't know--to report the news. It is a complete outrage the way the 
liberal media used its power to cover up facts relating to Hunter Biden 
and the Biden family and, yet, ran story after story with false 
information about the Russian investigation into Trump and the 
credibility of the Steele dossier.
  The recent news also shows that our report was not ``baseless''--that 
is the word that shows up all the time--and it didn't ``repackage old 
claims.'' That is another set of words that showed up quite regularly 
as people were trying to distract the Johnson and Grassley report.
  So quite the opposite--our report was well-founded, ahead of the 
curve, and right on the money, in more ways than one.
  Our report teed up the facts, but the mainstream press never stepped 
up to the plate.
  Some of the Nation's supposedly leading press outlets, with teams of 
investigative reporters, were scooped by the Congress--the Johnson-
Grassley report. Now, of course, they are scrambling to chase the story 
that they for so long ignored.
  Now, it didn't have to be this way. We already did much of the heavy 
lifting before issuing our report. The report made public information 
that hadn't ever been known before. For example, it showed the 
following: Hunter Biden and his associates and family members were 
connected to Chinese nationals and Chinese companies linked with the 
Communist Party and the People's Liberation Army. This includes the 
CEFC China Energy Company Limited and that company's subsidiaries.
  Records show that a company linked to the Communist regime sent 
Hunter Biden's law firm millions of dollars.
  Other records show that Hunter Biden opened a line of credit with a 
Chinese national linked to the Communist regime and funded it with 
approximately $100,000. Then he, James Biden, and Sara Biden went on an 
extravagant global spending spree.
  Still other records show that Hunter Biden, via his law firm, also 
sent a million dollars to James Biden's consulting firm, the Lion Hall 
Group. These transfers began less than 1 week after CEFC sent $5 
million to a company called Hudson West III, a company linked to CEFC 
and Chinese nationals associated with the Communist regime, which then 
sent money to Hunter Biden's law firm.
  When the bank contacted Sara Biden, who was associated with the 
firm's bank account, she refused to answer their questions and provide 
any additional documentation. According to the records that we have on 
file, the bank submitted the account for closure.
  Senator Johnson and I recently issued a supplemental to our report 
that showed Hunter Biden's close business associate Rob Walker received 
$6 million from a Chinese company linked to the Communist regime.
  There is yet another link in the chain from the Biden family and 
their associates to the Chinese Government.
  The report also showed that State Department officials believed that 
Hunter Biden's Burisma board membership created the perception of a 
conflict of interest and was ``very awkward for all U.S. officials 
pushing an anticorruption agenda in Ukraine,'' end of quote from a 
State Department official.
  Secretary of State Kerry publicly denied knowing of Hunter Biden's 
role on the Burisma board. We acquired evidence that shows that Kerry 
did, in fact, know about that role.
  In December 2015, instead of following U.S. objectives of confronting 
oligarchs, Vice President Biden's staff advised him to avoid commenting 
on Burisma's oligarch and instead say: ``I am not going to get into 
naming names or accusing individuals.''
  Joe Biden was running an anticorruption agenda in Ukraine, and he 
pulled his punches while his son was on the board of Burisma.
  Based on witness testimony, Burisma's owner allegedly paid a $7 
million bribe to officials serving under Ukraine's prosecutor general 
to shut the case against him. When he allegedly paid that bribe, Hunter 
Biden was on the Burisma board.
  These examples are just a sampling from the report that Senator 
Johnson and I put out and just the tip of the iceberg with respect to 
the Biden family's troubled ties to governments adverse to U.S. 
interests.
  These associations, and the millions of dollars that passed between 
and among Hunter Biden, James Biden, and others, create criminal 
financial, counterintelligence, and extortion concerns. That is why I 
have written to the Justice Department about the risk that Hunter and 
James Biden essentially served as agents of the Communist government 
for purposes of their registering under the Foreign Agents Registration 
Act.
  After Hunter Biden publicly confirmed he was under criminal 
investigation, liberal news outlets reported on concerns that his 
financial associations could create criminal financial and 
counterintelligence problems--something you heard from the Johnson-
Grassley report several weeks ago. That is what we said in September 
2020, and we were roundly criticized for it.
  And just over the weekend, a new email was made public that 
reportedly says that Joe Biden and his brother were ``office mates'' 
with the very same Chinese nationals whom we wrote about in our report. 
Those same individuals were the ones with links to the Communist regime 
and that regime's military.
  Based on all the facts known to date, Joe Biden has a lot of 
explaining to do. I have run many oversight operations and 
investigations during the course of my career. I am interested in the 
facts, in the evidence, and in the truth. I learned a lesson a long 
time ago when I first started my oversight focus; that is, no matter 
how difficult the media or the other side of the aisle makes it to find 
the facts, never give up. Keep working hard. The American taxpayers 
deserve nothing less.
  That is the attitude and approach that I have had my entire career, 
and that is what I will take with me as I continue to look into the 
Biden family matters and as I move to a leadership position on the 
Senate Judiciary Committee.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.