The Year of Hunter Biden: First Son Overshadows 2024 Election

If he isn’t already, the president’s son is about to become a household name. 

The election year has arrived, and Hunter Biden will come to personify the 2024 presidential campaign as much as his father and his top GOP rival, thanks to Republicans who control the House who have cast him as the main character in their investigation to take down his father, Joe Biden. 

This week alone, as the second session of Congress convenes in a new year driven by politics, two House committees are scheduled to meet to consider contempt charges against Hunter Biden, who is also due to be arraigned in federal court in California on charges of tax evasion that include explosive, tawdry details.

“The GOP is determined to keep this front and center as a way to muddy the waters, make people suspect that Biden is as much a threat to law and order as Trump,” said Julian Zelizer, a professor of history and public affairs at Princeton University. “They have a powerful platform to keep this message going regardless of lacking evidence of how this connects to the administration.” 

And while his name is routinely bandied about on Capitol Hill, Democrats also expect Hunter Biden will feature prominently in the GOP strategy leading up to November, when the president is expected to face a rematch against former President Donald Trump, the man he beat in 2020 who far and away leads the 2024 GOP primary pack.

One veteran Democratic presidential campaign strategist predicted Republicans will be weaving the younger Biden into the narrative for the entire election cycle. 

“It’s going to get really f*cking ugly,” the strategist told The Messenger, adding that the main goal for Republicans is to “muddy the waters and make Biden look as corrupt as Trump.”  

The intense focus on Hunter Biden begins Tuesday, when House GOP investigators plan to interview Georges Bergès, a New York art gallery owner who sells Hunter Biden’s artwork, a source familiar with the plans confirmed to The Messenger.

On Wednesday, both the House Oversight and Judiciary committees are scheduled to meet separately to consider measures to hold the first son in criminal contempt of Congress for dodging their subpoena for a closed-door deposition with GOP investigators. 

The congressional scrutiny of the president’s son this week coincides with the younger Biden’s scheduled arraignment on new federal tax charges in Los Angeles on Thursday. The criminal indictment against him stems from a years-long investigation that ballooned into a special counsel probe, consisting of charges that he spent lavishly on drugs, cars and women, while not paying his federal income taxes. 

The new year focus comes after the president’s son dominated much of the headlines regarding the impeachment investigation to close 2023, including his impromptu appearance outside the Capitol last month on the same day that he was scheduled to sit for a deposition in the probe. In their backyard, Hunter Biden accused Republican lawmakers of misrepresenting his private life and sullying his family for political gain.

The saga over contempt of Congress charges is expected to spill into at least next week. A source familiar with the planning says it's unlikely the full House will vote on contempt charges by the end of this week — but action will come soon enough.

“For too long, Hunter Biden has relied on his family name to get him out of trouble,” House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, said on X, formerly Twitter, Monday ahead of Wednesday's contempt proceedings against Hunter Biden.

Republicans have accused Hunter Biden of trading on his father’s name, making millions of dollars from overseas business deals. The investigation, however, has yet to prove that the president profited from his son's business dealings.

Supporters of the president’s son expect Trump and his allies in Congress will continue to thrust him into the epicenter of their election-year strategy to defeat his father, which Democrats allege includes the impeachment inquiry.

“This has always been about politics,” said one source close to the president’s son. “And it will continue to be.” 

“If we don’t think they’re going to use this every step of the way, we’re kidding ourselves," the Democratic campaign strategist said. "They live for this shit.” 

While refusing to comply with a subpoena to give a deposition behind closed doors, Hunter Biden has offered to testify publicly before Congress, which GOP chairmen of the major committees conducting the impeachment inquiry into President Biden have rejected.

The Biden legal team says Republicans have no intention of giving the president’s son a fair shot.

“It’s clear the Republican chairmen aren’t interested in getting the facts or they would allow Hunter to testify publicly," Abbe Lowell, Hunter Biden's lawyer, said in a statement. "Instead, House Republicans continue to play politics by seeking an unprecedented contempt motion against someone who has from the first request offered to answer all their proper questions. What are they afraid of?”

As Republicans shine a spotlight on Hunter Biden, House Democrats have renewed a focus on Trump’s conduct, seeking to draw a distinction between the alleged corruption of the Biden and Trump families. 

A new report released by Democrats on the House Oversight Committee last week, the culmination of an investigation launched in 2016, accused Trump of making nearly $8 million from foreign governments and entities while he was in office — Democrats say that total is likely much higher given the lack of financial documents provided to the committee. Those payments, Democrats argue, violate the Constitution’s ban on foreign emoluments.

Rep. Robert Garcia, D-Calif., said the 155-page report issued by Democrats shows the difference between Joe Biden and Trump.

“We’ll have to look at when they make their decisions between a decent man who has served his country well and is clearly under a sham impeachment inquiry that has zero evidence or credibility,” Garcia said this week. “Or between an essential Trump crime family that used their positions of power to grift the American people.”