Rep. James Comer is asking the Treasury Department for information about the financial dealings of the Biden family in one of his first acts as the head of the House Oversight Committee. He is also inviting a few former Twitter executives to appear at a public hearing.
Following Twitter’s temporary suppression of a 2020 story about Hunter Biden and his laptop, House Republicans are looking to exercise their investigative muscle and follow through on their promises to look into the finances of the Biden family and alleged political influence over technology companies.
Comer stated of his panel’s probe into Hunter Biden and the Biden family’s business operations, “Oversight and accountability are coming now that Democrats no longer have one-party rule in Washington.” “During the 118th Congress, House Republicans have made this probe a high priority.”
James Biden, the brother of the president, Hunter Biden, and a number of other members of the Biden family, as well as the connected corporations, are all listed in Comer’s request for bank activity reports from Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen for his panel.
Comer wrote to Yellen that “the Committee on Oversight and Accountability is investigating President Biden’s role in his family’s international influence-peddling operations and foreign business activities.”
When Republicans were in the minority, Comer frequently attempted to obtain these bank activity reports—also known as suspicious activity reports—but was mainly unsuccessful. Comer did not cite the source of those allegations and claimed to have only seen two.
The bank activity reports, also known as Suspicious Activity Reports, have previously been used by Comer as proof of possible wrongdoing by Joe Biden’s family members. However, such reports are not definitive and do not always point to misconduct. Millions of notifications of suspicious activity are filed by financial institutions each year, yet very few result in inquiries by law authorities.
Following Comer’s Wednesday request, the White House charged Republicans with indulging in “political stunts.”
According to a statement from Ian Sams, a spokesman for the White House Counsel’s office, “In their first week as a governing majority, House Republicans have not taken any meaningful action to address inflation and lower Americans’ costs, yet they’re jumping out of the gate with political stunts driven by the most extreme MAGA members of their caucus in an effort to get attention on Fox News.” “We hope House Republicans will join the President in calling attention to the critical problems on which the American people want their leaders to collaborate.”
Regarding Comer’s request, the Treasury Department declined to respond.
Additionally, Comer is requesting communications from the Treasury Department’s financial crimes enforcement division, the White House, and other departments within the department regarding those family members, connected businesses, and associates. He wants all of these communications returned by January 25.
The letters Comer wrote to former Twitter employees provided a roadmap for his future investigation plans. The letters to former deputy general counsel James Baker, former director of trust and safety Yoel Roth, and former head of legal, policy, and trust Vijaya Gadde request that all three testify at a public hearing the week of February 6. They follow a previous set of letters Comer sent in December demanding their testimony.
Each of the letters to the former Twitter employees reads, “Your attendance is important because of your role in restricting Americans’ access to information about the Biden family on Twitter just before the 2020 election.”
Republicans have used the so-called Twitter files as proof of government censorship, but none of the messages that have been made public so far suggest that the FBI specifically instructed Twitter to bury an article that contained information from a laptop owned by Hunter Biden. According to a previous investigation by AWN, the FBI agent at the centre of the dispute, as well as a number of other federal employees and tech CEOs, have all denied that such an order ever existed.
While denying that he personally attempted to edit the article, Roth has stated in public that the Hunter Biden story appeared to be the result of a hack-and-leak operation.
“I personally oversaw the suppression of the Hunter Biden narrative, as is generally reported. This is untrue. It is categorically false, according to Roth, who spoke with tech journalist Kara Swisher on a podcast last year.
Comer’s requests follow his and Jim Jordan’s commitments to look into the federal government’s control over digital businesses.
Comer said that Judiciary personnel could observe some of his committee’s interviews if there are any topics of interest that are shared, such as Twitter, in an interview with AWN earlier this week.
There is some overlap, but Jim and I won’t have any issues with it, Comer stated in the interview. He is aware of our guests. We understand who he is inviting.