In a significant development, Hunter Biden’s plea deal has fallen apart, according to federal prosecutors and the defense.
He was slated to enter a guilty plea to two tax-related charges at a federal court in Delaware on Wednesday.
Hunter’s plea deal reportedly unraveled when the two sides could not agree on whether admitting to two tax crimes would immunize the president’s son from possible additional charges, according to The Washington Post.
U.S. District Court Judge Maryellen Noreika asked federal prosecutors and Biden’s lawyers to come to some “meeting of the minds.”
However, the two sides said they did not see eye to eye about the precise terms of their own plea agreement.
Biden’s lawyer at one point said there was no deal.
Hunter ultimately pleaded “not guilty” to the charges.
As part of the deal, orchestrated by the Justice Department, Biden Jr. was expected to sidestep prosecution and jail time over a firearm-related charge, pending judicial approval.
The agreement materialized after an extended federal investigation led by David C. Weiss, a Delaware-based prosecutor originally appointed by former President Donald Trump.
Despite a shift in the administration, Weiss was retained by the Justice Department under Biden.
If the agreement were to pass judicial muster, Hunter Biden would likely avoid incarceration.
Hunter Biden was sighted entering the courthouse in Wilmington, Delaware, where the proceedings were set to start at approximately 10 a.m. EST, The New York Times reports.
The plea deal sparked controversy among Republicans, who have been unearthing alleged Biden family corruption.
They claim that the deal is excessively lenient and argue that testimonies from two IRS investigators indicate that the Justice Department undermined the investigation.
The Republican party, led by ex-President Trump, has persistently revealed Hunter Biden’s international business engagements and moral shortcomings, including his crack cocaine addiction and use of prostitutes.
According to the plea deal, Hunter Biden was set to admit to the minor offenses of failing to pay his taxes for the years 2017 and 2018.
The Justice Department indicates that he failed to pay taxes on an annual income exceeding $1.5 million, resulting in tax dues of over $100,000 each year.
In addition, Hunter Biden faced charges related to the acquisition of a handgun in 2018, where he inaccurately claimed on an official document that he was not a drug user.
Under a pretrial diversion agreement, the Justice Department had agreed not to pursue prosecution for this charge, on the condition that Hunter disposes of any weapons and abstains from drug use for a period of two years.
Hunter Biden has previously been at the center of controversy, particularly for his role as a board member for a Ukrainian energy firm.
Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA) recently released an unclassified FBI record detailing allegations of a criminal scheme involving then-Vice President Joe Biden, his son Hunter, and a Ukrainian business executive.
The senator procured the document, identified as an FD-1023, through legally protected disclosures by Justice Department whistleblowers.
“For the better part of a year, I’ve been pushing the Justice Department and FBI to provide details on its handling of very significant allegations from a trusted FBI informant implicating then-Vice President Biden in a criminal bribery scheme,” Grassley stated in a press release.
He continued, underscoring the gravity of the situation: “While the FBI sought to obfuscate and redact, the American people can now read this document for themselves, without the filter of politicians or bureaucrats, thanks to brave and heroic whistleblowers.”
The allegations connect to Burisma, a Ukrainian gas company that reportedly recruited Hunter Biden onto its board to circumnavigate potential issues via his father’s influence.
The company was in the throes of a corruption investigation in Ukraine at the time it sought business dealings in the United States.
Mykola Zlochevsky, the CEO of Burisma, allegedly stated that payments of $5 million each were made to Hunter Biden and Joe Biden in a scheme described as “poluchili,” which translates from Russian crime slang to mean “forced or coerced to pay,” according to the released document.
Senator Grassley previously exposed the FBI’s possession of “significant and voluminous evidence of potential criminality involving the Biden family” last year, and since then has been pushing for the release of this FBI record.
The congressman has been working in conjunction with House Committee on Oversight and Accountability Chairman James Comer.
Comer said, “In the FBI’s record, the Burisma executive claims that he didn’t pay the ‘big guy’ (Joe Biden) directly but that he used several bank accounts to conceal the money. That sounds an awful lot like how the Bidens conduct business: using multiple bank accounts to hide the source and total amount of the money.”
The allegations are bolstered by claims of physical evidence, including numerous recordings and text messages.
Burisma’s Zlochevsky reportedly maintained he had two recordings with Joe Biden and 15 recordings with Hunter Biden.
The Burisma executive also held onto two documents thought to be financial records as evidence of the arrangement.
In the document, Zlochevsky predicted it could take investigators up to 10 years to uncover the full extent of the illicit payments to the Bidens.
