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WASHINGTON — White House press secretary Jen Psaki insisted Friday that President Biden “does not” talk business with his son — despite new records indicating otherwise — and separately confirmed that Hunter Biden still co-owns a Chinese investment firm.
Psaki denied that the president talks business with his son in response to new evidence that he met, while vice president, with Hunter Biden’s business associates from Ukraine, Russia, Kazakhstan and Mexico.
“The president does not discuss business dealings with family members and otherwise I’m not going to respond to Rudy Giuliani’s lawyer,” Psaki said in response to a question from The Post at her daily press briefing.
Psaki, who also was asked at the briefing about ethical questions involving the first son’s new art career, additionally confirmed to The Post that Hunter Biden still co-owns a Chinese investment firm known as BHR Partners, which was formed 12 days after he joined his father aboard Air Force Two for a December 2013 trip to Beijing.
A Hunter Biden-owned Delaware company, Skaneateles LLC, owns 10 percent of BHR, according to recently reported business records.
“He’s working to unload that. I’d point you to his representatives,” Psaki said. An attorney for Hunter Biden did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The Wall Street Journal reports that the firm is “controlled and funded primarily by large Chinese government-owned shareholders,” including the Bank of China. Although it had initial goals of raising $1.5 billion in investment capital, it reportedly fell far short.
Psaki made the swipe at Giuliani after being pressed on Biden’s 2019 claim that “I have never spoken to my son about his overseas business dealings.” Giuliani and his lawyer, Bob Costello, helped publicize the contents of a laptop formerly belonging to Hunter Biden.
Documents and photos from the laptop, first reported by The Post, indicate that Joe Biden attended a 2015 dinner at Cafe Milano in DC’s Georgetown neighborhood with a group of his son’s associates — including a trio of Kazakhs and the Russian billionaire Yelena Baturina and her husband, ex-Moscow mayor Yury Luzhkov.
A photo depicts the elder Biden posing with the Kazakhstani group, and one day later, Vadym Pozharskyi, an executive at Ukrainian energy firm Burisma, which paid Hunter Biden $83,000 per month to sit on its board, emailed the then-second son to thank him for the opportunity to meet his father.
Pozharskyi’s email first emerged ahead of the November presidential election, but the Biden campaign cast doubt on its authenticity.
A Senate report released in September said a firm linked to Hunter Biden received $3.5 million from Baturina in 2014. The senators said they did not know the purpose of the payment and Psaki previously said she was unfamiliar with the Senate report, despite it coming up in both presidential debates last year.
Photos and emails published by The Post in June also indicate that Joe Biden in 2015 hosted his son and a group of Mexican business associates at the vice president’s official residence.
In 2016, Hunter Biden apparently emailed one of those associates while aboard Air Force Two for an official visit to Mexico, complaining that he hadn’t received reciprocal business favors after “I have brought every single person you have ever asked me to bring to the F’ing White House and the Vice President’s house and the inauguration.”
Hunter Biden’s business pursuits often invited questions about influence-peddling and corruption, and his father said his family would cease overseas business work once he assumed the White House.
The incoming president said in December that Hunter wouldn’t “be involved in any business, any enterprise that is in conflict with or appears to be in conflict with where there’s appropriate distance from the presidency.”
Hunter Biden recently announced plans for a debut sale of his art, seeking up to $500,000 per painting. The buyers won’t be named publicly and the White House claims Hunter Biden won’t learn their identities.
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