Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, was paid for his work as a board member a Ukrainian oligarch-owned energy company while his father was vice president, the New York Times confirms. According to the Times, Hunter Biden was paid “as much as $50,000 per month in some months” as a board member of Burisma Holdings, a natural gas firm owned by a member of the Ukrainian oligarchy. Vice President Biden was heavily involved in mediating U.S. policy towards Ukraine. When a Ukrainian prosecutor launched a corruption investigation into the energy company Hunter Biden was board member of, Joe Biden threatened to withhold $1 billion in U.S. loan guarantees to the country if the Ukrainian government did not fire the prosecutor. As John Solomon of The Hill reported, Biden’s threat would have thrown the former Soviet republic into insolvency at a time when Ukraine was fending off threats from Vladimir Putin’s Russia. In a speech last year before the Council on Foreign Relations, the former vice president bragged about his successful use of these strong-arm tactics to get the prosecutor fired, saying that he told the Ukrainians, “If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money.” Biden then boasted, “Well, son of a bitch, he got fired.” Kenneth Vogel and Iuliia Mendel report at the Times: It was a foreign policy role Joseph R. Biden Jr. enthusiastically embraced during his vice presidency: browbeating Ukraine’s notoriously corrupt government to clean up its act. And one of his most memorable performances came on a trip to Kiev in March 2016, when he threatened to withhold $1 billion in United States loan guarantees if Ukraine’s leaders did not dismiss the country’s top prosecutor, who had been accused of turning a blind eye to corruption in his own office and among the political elite. The pressure campaign worked. The prosecutor general, long a target of criticism from other Western nations and international lenders, was soon voted out by the Ukrainian Parliament. Among those who had a stake in the outcome was Hunter Biden, Mr. Biden’s younger son, who at the time was on the board of an energy company owned by a Ukrainian oligarch who had been in the sights of the fired prosecutor general. Hunter Biden was a Yale-educated lawyer who had served on the boards of Amtrak and a number of nonprofit organizations and think tanks, but lacked any experience in Ukraine and just months earlier had been discharged from the Navy Reserve after testing positive for cocaine. He would be paid as much as $50,000 per month in some months for his work for the company, Burisma Holdings. The current Ukrainian general prosecutor, Yuriy Lutsenko, has reopened the corruption probe into Burisma Holdings, The Hill reports. Hunter Biden’s involvement with the Ukrainian energy firm and his sweetheart deals with China’s communist regime while his father was vice president were exposed in Peter Schweizer’s bestselling book Secret Empires. In an interview last month on SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Tonight, Schweizer explained, “Joe Biden was the Obama administration’s point-person on policy towards Ukraine. He steered $1.8 billion in aid to that government and while he was doing so, his son got a sweetheart deal with this energy company that — we’ve been able to trace over just a 14-month period — paid $3.1 million into an account where Hunter Biden was getting paid.” “Suffice to say, Hunter Biden has no background in Ukraine,” Schweizer noted. “He has no background in energy policy. There’s really no legitimate explanation as to why he got this deal with this energy company, other than the fact his father was responsible for doling out money in Ukraine itself.” “It’s a huge problem,” Schweizer added. “And it goes to this question of corruption and potential payoffs and bribes that these foreign entities were making to the Bidens in exchange for hopefully getting favorable treatment.”<doc-sep>With former Vice President Joseph Biden finally entering the presidential race last week and quickly becoming the Democratic frontrunner there's been some speculation that an unconventional romantic situation in his family could become a distraction to his campaign. Biden's son, Beau Biden, the former attorney general of Delaware, died of brain cancer in May of 2015. At some point afterward, Beau's widow, Hallie, began a relationship with Hunter Biden, her late husband's brother and the former vice president's other son. Per Page Six, this led to Hunter Biden's separation from his former wife. But on Tuesday the same outlet, Page Six, reported that Hunter and Hallie had split up. "It is believed they have now broken up," the site reported, adding that Hallie had said "no comment" when asked if the relationship was over. Hunter Biden said in an interview earlier this year that the circumstances of his divorce and his relationship with his late brother's widow shouldn't have any effect on his father's run for president. "The important aspect of my complicated divorce (like all divorces) and an equally complicated life, marked by the tragic loss of my mother, sister and brother is this: My father has been a constant source of love and strength in my life," Hunter Biden said, per Vanity Fair. Hunter has also been implicated in some questionable overseas business dealings, per that same Vanity Fair story. It's unclear why exactly the story of Hunter and Hallie would reflect poorly on Joseph Biden or his presidential candidacy. The elder Biden, after all, didn't have anything to do with the affair, and voters who are reminded of the many terrible family tragedies that have affected the former vice president, they're more likely to sympathize with him than anything else. Hunter Biden splits from brother Beau’s widow Hallie https://t.co/dcshTHhdXX pic.twitter.com/y0PjcqszoM — Page Six (@PageSix) May 1, 2019 Joe Biden and his wife Jill have been supportive of the relationship in their public comments. "We are all lucky that Hunter and Hallie found each other as they were putting their lives together again after such sadness," the Bidens said in a statement in 2017. "They have mine and Jill's full and complete support and we are happy for them." While Biden has been criticized for various gaffes in his campaign thus far, Biden appears to have a significant lead in the early polls for the Democratic presidential nomination. The Quinnipiac University National Poll released Tuesday found that Biden leads the Democratic field with 38 percent of the vote, a 26-point margin over Elizabeth Warren, who is second with 12 percent.<doc-sep>One week after Joe Biden announced he was running for president in 2020, his son Hunter Biden, 49, has reportedly split from Hallie Biden, 45, his partner of two years. Their relationship was controversial to many due to the fact that she is the widow of Hunter's brother Joseph "Beau" Biden, who died in 2015 at the age of 46 due to brain cancer. Beau and Hallie had two children together, both a son and a daughter. Read: Trump Welcomes 'Sleepy Joe' As Joe Biden Launches 2020 Presidential Bid, His Third When they were first revealed to be dating, Hunter was still legally married to his then-wife Kathleen, though they had been estranged since 2015. Their divorce was finalized in April 2017. A source told New York Post's Page Six that Hunter's separation from Hallie is “amicable.” Details regarding the reason for the breakup remain unknown. Hunter, who had previously acknowledged the publicity about his relationship, said in a statement in January, "My father has always been proud of me — whether when I was volunteering for the Jesuits, or working as a lawyer... And he remains proud of me today. He loves me. And he loves the American people far too much to let any form of adversity stand in the way of service." Photo: PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images<doc-sep>
Well, look at that. Somehow perfectly coinciding with former Vice President Joe Biden officially entering the presidential race, a very salacious family drama has resolved itself, sort of. I’m talking about Hunter Biden’s relationship with his deceased brother’s widow, Hallie. It’s reportedly come to an end. And if you are trying to wrap your head around the fact that a) there was a relationship to begin with and b) that you somehow did not know this, welcome to the club. Apparently the two started dating in 2017, two years after Beau died of brain cancer. Hunter also happened to be married at the time, though his divorce with Kathleen Biden after 22 years of marriage was finalized in April 2017. And to make matters worse—Biden and his wife, Jill, gave a very public thumbs up to the relationship. “We are all lucky that Hunter and Hallie found each other as they were putting their lives together again after such sadness,” the VP told Page Six in 2017. “They have mine and Jill’s full and complete support and we are happy for them.” Hunter himself also chimed in publicly in January with a long statement to Vanity Fair. “The important aspect of my complicated divorce (like all divorces) and an equally complicated life, marked by the tragic loss of my mother, sister and brother is this: My father has been a constant source of love and strength in my life,” he said. “Even though my life has been played out in the media, because I am a Biden, my father never once suggested that the family’s public profile should be my priority. The priority has always been clear for my dad, as it is, now, for me: Never run from a struggle. Love people and find a way to love yourself. And remember that the two things are very much connected . [….] So, you ask me, whether my father might not run for President because of reports about me in the news. What you fail to realize, in asking such a question, is that my father has always been proud of me—whether when I was volunteering for the Jesuits, or working as a lawyer. And he remains proud of me today. He loves me. And he loves the American people far too much to let any form of adversity stand in the way of service.” Beyond Biden's family drama that will undoubtedly be scrutinized as the race heats up, there’s more to Hunter’s past than a sketchy affair (and no, I’m not talking about his ex-wife’s claim in their divorce papers that he blew their money on prostitutes, drugs, and strip clubs). I'm talking about this: For 5 years, HUNTER BIDEN was on the board of a gas company owned by a Ukrainian oligarch accused of enriching himself using his position in the Russia-aligned YANUKOVYCH gov't. BIDEN stepped down last month, as his dad was preparing to run for president. https://t.co/tblUPYPJMG — Kenneth P. Vogel (@kenvogel) May 2, 2019 No doubt Biden and his team have calculated the risks associated with his family's drama. We'll see how much they affect his candidacy in a very crowded (and growing by the day) field of Democrats vying for the party's nomination. If the past is any indication, however, since he's running with a D next to his name, it probably won't affect him at all.