Former President Joe Biden left office almost 80 days ago. Yet his presidency and his family, especially his son Hunter Biden, continue to make news.
Most recently, the Trump State Department released a letter the younger Biden wrote while his father served as vice president, according to The New York Times.
In his letter, bearing the letterhead of Ukrainian energy company Burisma, Hunter Biden asked the U.S. ambassador to Italy for “support and guidance” to overcome regulatory issues Burisma faced. The State Department responded by shipping off a Commerce Department official to Tuscany to help.
Will President Biden’s presidential pardon protect his son?
A recently published book by White House reporters addresses the key role Hunter Biden played as an adviser to his father, showing he was much more pivotal to day-to-day operations than previously thought.
Reporter Jonathan Allen, who wrote “Fight: Inside the Wildest Battle for the White House,” revealed that the reality behind the president and his son’s relationship was much different than previously perceived.
“Most people have looked at Hunter Biden as somebody that his father has had to deal with. And what we really found in the reporting here is that Hunter Biden is somebody that his father wanted to deal with on political issues, that Hunter was, as was described to us by one source, his father’s closest political adviser," Allen told Vanity Fair.
Before President Biden left office, he issued a sweeping pardon for his son for any crimes he may have committed between 2014 and 2024.
Although the then-president had previously ruled out any pardons for his son, the situation changed after Hunter Biden was found guilty of gun and tax-related charges in two separate trials.
The presidential pardon protected him from facing sentencing for those crimes, but he has had to deal with other consequences. Last week, Hunter Biden gave up his license to practice law in Washington, D.C., after acquiring his license in 2007. The details of the proceedings are sealed.
Hunter Biden and his ex-associates
Meanwhile, President Donald Trump pardoned two former business associates of Hunter Biden, Devon Archer and Jason Galanis, in recent weeks.
“Many people have asked me to do this. They think he was treated very unfairly," Trump said ahead of signing the pardon for Archer on March 26. "And I looked at the records, studied the records. And he was a victim of a crime, as far as I’m concerned. So we’re going to undo that."
The White House did not offer an explanation for Galanis’ pardon. He and Archer were found guilty of defrauding a Native American community.
At the time of their sentencing in September 2020, Acting U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Audrey Strauss issued a statement saying Galanis and his co-conspirators, including Archer, “engaged in market manipulation and the defrauding of shareholders, and they stole a large portion of the proceeds of tribal bonds that were intended to fund economic development projects.” Galanis was sentenced to more than 15 years in prison, while Archer faced a year and a day in jail.
Both the ex-associates testified in the Republican impeachment inquiry against President Biden.
“The entire value-add of Hunter Biden to our business was his family name and his access to his father,” Galanis said in March 2024 from prison. As per the public evidence, he didn’t know Hunter Biden as well as Archer, who was involved with the younger Biden in Burisma and Rosemont Seneca Partners, an investment firm.