The son of 2020 presidential hopeful Joe Biden breaks his
silence before his father takes the debate stage in Ohio; reaction and analysis
on 'The Five.'
A State Department official focused on Ukraine policy
told Congress this week he raised concerns about Hunter Biden’s role on the board of a Ukrainian
natural gas firm in 2015, but was rebuffed by former Vice
President Joe Biden’s staff which said the office was
preoccupied with Beau Biden's cancer battle, Fox News has confirmed.
Deputy Assistant Secretary of State George
Kent, who testified behind closed doors before committees spearheading the
formal House impeachment inquiry, told congressional investigators that he had
qualms about Hunter Biden’s role on the board of the Ukrainian energy company
Burisma Holdings.
The Washington Post first reported details of Kent’s
testimony on Friday, which included his concerns that the younger Biden’s role
in the company could complicate U.S. diplomatic efforts with Ukrainian
officials, and raised the issue of a possible conflict of interest. Kent also
testified that he was worried that Hunter Biden’s position would make Ukrainian
officials think he was a channel of influence to his father, who was vice
president at the time.
A congressional source confirmed to Fox News on Friday
that Kent testified that when he brought his concerns to the office of the vice
president in 2016, his staff blew him off and ignored the issue involving
the younger Biden's role at the firm. The Post first reported that the
staff said they did not have the "bandwidth" to deal with the issue,
as his other son, Beau Biden, was battling cancer. Beau Biden died in 2015.
Biden's campaign responded to this story on Friday by
ripping into President Trump. "Donald Trump's unprecedently corrupt
administration is melting down because of the scandal he touched-off by trying
to get Ukraine to lie about Joe Biden--and as the vice president said
yesterday, he should release his tax returns or shut up," a Biden campaign
spokesperson told Fox News. "On Joe Biden's watch, the U.S. made
eradicating corruption a centerpiece of our policies toward Ukraine including
achieving the removal of an inept prosecutor who shielded wrongdoers from
accountability."
Meanwhile, during his deposition on Tuesday, sources
told Fox News that Kent spoke extensively about accusations of corruption
linked to Burisma, noting it was a big problem as it relates to Ukraine.
Kent had repeatedly raised concerns with the Obama
administration about the company, specifically providing an example in 2016,
when he raised concerns with the Obama administration’s USAID about dropping a
planned event with Burisma. Kent testified that the event involved children,
and he did not feel comfortable with photos of children in conjunction with
Burisma.
Sources also told Fox News that Kent told congressional
investigators about the Obama administration’s efforts to remove Ukrainian
prosecutor Viktor Shokin from his post. At the time, Shokin was investigating
Mykola Zlochevsky, the former minister of ecology and natural resources of
Ukraine ” also the founder of Burisma.
Shokin was fired in April 2016, and his case was closed
by the prosecutor who replaced him, Yuriy Lutsenko. Biden once famously boasted
on camera that when he was vice president and leading the Obama administration’s
Ukraine policy he successfully pressured Ukraine to fire Shokin ” who was
investigating Burisma Holdings while Hunter sat on the board.
Biden allies, though, maintain that his intervention
prompting the firing of Shokin had nothing to do with his son, but was rather
tied to corruption concerns.
However, Kent testified that while Shokin faced
accusations of corruption, his replacement, Lutsenko, did too and that both
ex-prosecutors were godfathers to former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko’s
children. However, according to sources, Kent said that while the United States
pushed hard for Shokin to be fired, no one ever pushed for Lutsenko to be
fired.
Shokin was widely accused of corruption on both sides of
the Atlantic. Biden has said that the international community was supportive
and pushing for his firing, but sources told Fox News that Kent testified that
it was the United States who led that international effort to get him removed.
Kent also noted, according to sources, that the international community was
deferential to the U.S. on the topic.
Kent's testimony comes amid the House's formal
impeachment inquiry, launched earlier this month by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi,
D-Calif., after revelations surrounding Trump's highly-controversial phone call
with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. The impeachment inquiry is being
led by House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, House Foreign Affairs
Committee Chairman Eliot Engel, and acting Oversight Committee Chair Carolyn
Maloney--who filled the post after Rep. Elijah Cummings' death on Thursday.
The Ukraine controversy, which sparked the impeachment
inquiry, began when a whistleblower reported that the president had pushed
Zelensky to launch an investigation into the Biden family’s business dealings
in Ukraine ”specifically, why Biden
pressured Poroshenko to fire Shokin, who was investigating Burisma
Holdings, where Hunter was on the board. The president's request came after
millions in U.S. military aid to Ukraine had been frozen, something critics
have cited as evidence of a quid pro quo arrangement. The whistleblower's
complaint stated their concerns that Trump was soliciting a foreign power to
influence the 2020 presidential election.
The White House and the president's allies have denied
any sort of quid pro quo, and the Biden's have maintained that they did
"nothing wrong."
During Tuesday night's Democratic primary debate, Biden
was asked about his son's role at Burisma, to which he stated: My son did
nothing wrong. I did nothing wrong. I carried out the policy of the United
States government, which was to root out corruption in Ukraine and that’s what
we should be focusing on.
Earlier that day, Hunter Biden. during an interview
with ABC’s Good Morning America, likewise defended his role, claiming he did
nothing improper, though he did acknowledge it was "poor
judgment" to have joined the company's board.
Brooke
Singman is a Politics Reporter for Fox News. Follow her on Twitter at @brookefoxnews.
