Hunter Biden willing to testify on Capitol Hill in December, his lawyers say
(CNN) — Hunter Biden’s lawyers have told the House Oversight Committee that the president’s son is willing to testify on December 13 in their inquiry into his actions — but only if he can do so publicly, according to a letter Hunter Biden’s legal team sent to the committee that CNN obtained.
“We have seen you use closed-door sessions to manipulate, even distort the facts and misinform the public. We therefore propose opening the door. If, as you claim, your efforts are important and involve issues that Americans should know about, then let the light shine on these proceedings,” Hunter Biden’s lawyers wrote in the letter.
CNN has reached out to the House Oversight Committee for comment.
Earlier this month, the Republican-led committee subpoenaed Hunter and James Biden, President Joe Biden’s son and brother, setting up a highly anticipated showdown as House Republicans continue to search for whether the president committed an impeachable offense in connection to his family’s foreign business dealings – a high bar they have yet to meet.
The subpoenas were the first time the panel has directly subpoenaed members of the Biden family and come as House Republicans on the House Oversight and Judiciary committees are focusing on a list of high-profile interviews they want to conduct before wrapping up their impeachment inquiry into the president.
The oversight committee also subpoenaed an assistant US attorney working on Hunter’s criminal case after whistleblowers with the Internal Revenue Service alleged political interference in the case. One high-ranking IRS official along with the special counsel investigating Hunter, David Weiss, have disputed claims by the whistleblowers in congressional testimony.
Hunter’s attorney, Abbe Lowell, has vehemently criticized the Republican-led investigation into Hunter, calling it a “political stunt” riddled with “discredited conspiracies about the Biden family.” The letter bashed House Republicans’ impeachment inquiry, which revolves around ties connections between the president and Hunter’s business dealings.
Republicans’ allegations of “corruption” by the Bidens are still uncorroborated and they have essentially fallen flat in their efforts to connect Joe Biden to the money his son made in China and elsewhere.
“Here we are, eleven months into your so-called investigation, and every objective review of your ‘revelations’ — including by some of your colleagues — has declared your exploration as one turning up only dry holes,” Hunter Biden’s lawyers wrote.
“Your Committee has been working for almost a year—without success—to tie our client’s business activities to his father,” Lowell wrote in his letter Tuesday in response to the subpoena, adding that, instead of Hunter, the committee should investigate former President Donald Trump and his family’s business.
House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer, the Republican who issued the subpoena, previously said Hunter Biden’s testimony was needed to determine the extent that “Joe Biden knew, was involved, and benefited from his family’s influence peddling schemes.”
This story has been updated with additional information.
CNN’s Holmes Lybrand and Marshall Cohen contributed to this report.