The Biden Gang: Congressional probe puts Hunter Biden’s associates in the crosshairs

A House probe into President Biden’s family and the massive profits they reaped from foreign business deals is honing in on the web of business associates of the president’s son, Hunter Biden, according to congressional investigators.

The investigators, who plan to follow the money up the food chain, are now looking at a group of family chums, Washington insiders and foreign impresarios who helped grease the wheels for a series of lucrative deals.

The House Oversight and Accountability Committee is reviewing Treasury statements and bank accounts in a quest to track down the foreign business arrangements and determine if Mr. Biden had any knowledge or role in the schemes and whether it has compromised national security.

These are the top members of Hunter Biden’s deal-making gang who are in the committee’s sights.

Eric Schwerin

Mr. Schwerin, 53, served as Hunter Biden’s business partner and close friend. He has agreed to cooperate and provide documents to the GOP-led investigation of the business deals that often involved countries where the elder Mr. Biden led on U.S. policy as vice president in the Obama administration.

SEE ALSO: Biden bagman in mystery China payouts exposed as Clinton-linked lobbyist

Mr. Schwerin was president of the now-defunct Rosemont Seneca Partners, an investment management firm founded by Hunter Biden that pursued deals in Ukraine, Russia, China and other countries. 
Chris Heinz, the stepson of President Biden’s special envoy for climate, former Sen. John Kerry, was also a Rosemont Seneca co-founder.

Mr. Schwerin became a frequent visitor to the Obama White House after Rosemont Seneca began engaging in foreign deals, and he helped the Biden family, including Joe Biden, manage their finances. 

Republicans investigating Hunter Biden and other Biden family members for evidence of influence peddling say Mr. Schwerin’s 27 White House visits during the Obama administration cast doubt on Joe Biden’s statement, made in 2019, that he has “never spoken” to Hunter Biden about his son’s business dealings. Mr. Schwerin and Hunter Biden may have first been introduced to one another during the Clinton administration when the two worked for the Commerce Department, Mr. Schwerin as a senior adviser for international trade and Hunter Biden as policy director for e-commerce.

Mr. Schwerin was twice appointed by President Obama to serve on the U.S. Commission for Preservation of America’s Heritage Abroad.

John Robinson “Rob” Walker

Mr. Walker has emerged as the centerpiece of the congressional probe into the Biden family business deals. He once said that exposing his financial dealings with the First Family would “bury all of us.”

SEE ALSO: Comer demands answers from Biden family associate behind Chinese wire payouts

The Oversight and Reform Committee wants to know what Mr. Walker meant by that warning. Calling him a “critical witness,” they’re planning to have Mr. Walker appear for an interview with the investigators.

Mr. Walker is a top target of the probe, in part, because he distributed more than $1 million to Biden family members beginning in March 2017. Mr. Walker made the payouts a day after he received a $3 million wire transfer from State Energy HK Limited, an affiliate of CEFC China Energy Co., an oil company backed by the Chinese Communist Party.

The money was divided among the Bidens, Mr. Walker and another business associate, British citizen James Gilliar. 

The committee’s chairman, Rep. James Comer of Kentucky said in a statement that “it is unclear what services were provided in return” for the money, which came less than two months after Mr. Biden’s second term as vice president ended.

Mr. Walker began his career in politics on Bill Clinton’s presidential campaign team and later worked in the Clinton administration at the Transportation Department and the Federal Aviation Administration. 

Mr. Walker promoted his high-level government connections after he moved into the private sector and began seeking foreign investment partners. It’s not clear how he first met Hunter Biden. His wife, Betsy Massey Walker, was a top aide to Jill Biden while she was the second lady in the Obama White House.

Mr. Walker was a partner along with Hunter Biden, President Biden’s brother James Biden, Mr. Gilliar and Tony Bobulinski in the business venture Sinohawk Holdings. The group planned to set up a business deal with CEFC China Energy Co. 

Mr. Bobulinski said in 2020 that Mr. Walker arranged for him to meet with the elder Mr. Biden in 2017 to discuss CEFC.

Mr. Walker is said to have a very close relationship with the Biden family.

Devon Archer

Rosemont Seneca’s third partner, Mr. Archer, is a former Abercrombie and Fitch fashion model who attended Yale with Mr. Heinz. He was recently convicted of fraud unrelated to the Biden influence-peddling investigation.

Mr. Archer, 48, joined Hunter Biden in 2014 as a member of the board of Burisma Holdings Limited, a natural gas company based in Kyiv, Ukraine. The company paid Rosemont Seneca $3.4 million in consulting fees meant for both Mr. Archer and Mr. Biden, who were each paid $80,000 per month.

Burisma reportedly hired Mr. Biden to protect the company from being prosecuted on corruption charges.

Mr. Archer met in the White House with Vice President Biden one week before Mr. Archer joined the Burisma board. After he joined the Burisma board, Mr. Archer also appeared in an infamous photo on a golf course with Hunter Biden, Vice President Biden and an unknown man.

The Oversight panel is examining suspicious activity reports from the Treasury that flagged irregular financial activities by Mr. Archer. The investigators also plan to examine his bank accounts, along with those of other Biden business partners, to help determine the extent of what they say could be an influence-peddling scheme involving the president. 

Mr. Archer resigned from Rosemont Seneca after he was arrested in 2016 on charges he defrauded the Oglala Sioux tribe of $60 million in bonds. He was sentenced in February 2022 to one year and one day in prison and was ordered to forfeit $15.7 million and pay another $43.4 million in restitution. Hunter Biden was not implicated or involved in the fraud. 

James Gilliar

The most elusive of Hunter Biden’s former business associates, Mr. Gilliar is a British citizen and former special forces officer who in 2017 partnered with Hunter Biden to plan a business venture with CEFC China Energy Co. 

James Biden was also included in the plan, along with Mr. Walker and Mr. Bobulinski. 

While that venture did not yield any deals, one of Mr. Gilliar’s companies received a $1,065,000 million payment on March 2, 2017, from Mr. Walker, who a day earlier had been wired $3 million from State Energy HK Limited.

Mr. Gilliar made a possible reference to the elder Mr. Biden’s involvement in the deal. 

In a 2017 email revealed by Mr. Bobulinski two weeks before the 2020 presidential election, Mr. Gilliar suggested Hunter Biden reserve 10% of his payout from Sinohawk Holdings “for the big guy.”

The email said, “10 held by H for the big guy?” Mr. Bobulinski said the “H” stood for Hunter Biden and “the big guy” stood for Joe Biden, who had just departed the Obama White House and was considered a likely 2020 Democratic presidential candidate.