WASHINGTON — President Biden played comedian-in-chief Tuesday, claiming he “bounced a few checks” when he was younger and that getting his old bank records is “really hard to do, man” — as House Republicans pore over financial documents to see if he received any foreign income.
Biden made the cash cracks as an ongoing House impeachment inquiry examines the finances of his brother James Biden and son Hunter Biden, whose associates from countries such as China and Ukraine regularly interacted with Joe Biden while he was vice president.
“My administration banned banks and credit unions from charging fees for basic services like checking your account balance. I love that one,” Biden, 80, said at a White House event touting financial regulations to reduce fees on retirees.
“I got so damned mad when I found — anyway, retrieving old bank records, that’s really hard to do, man,” Biden said.
“Or looking up the balance on your loan — that’s a killer, man. It costs so much money for those banks. They charge up to $30 for these services. and, you know, when you bounce a few checks like I did when I was trying to get started, it — anyway, that’s over.”
“We’ve taken those fees, they’re now illegal,” he added.
The Biden administration’s effort to curb such fees is one of its most popular initiatives, polling indicates.
Although the president found it “really hard” to locate his old bank records, House Republicans found it surprisingly easy to get major financial institutions to cough up details about the first family.
The president did not respond to a shouted question after the event about whether his bank records would show that he received foreign funds.
Earlier this month, the House Oversight Committee revealed that James Biden paid Joe Biden $200,000 on March 1, 2018 — the same day that James received a $200,000 transfer from troubled rural hospital company Americore by pledging to use his political connections to secure a Middle Eastern investor.
The Oversight Committee’s chairman, Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), has said that additional revelations from the bank records will soon be released.
The $200,000 check from James to Joe Biden was labeled as a “loan repayment” and House Democrats and the White House have described the transfer as a non-story. Comer says that Republicans have been unable to locate bank records showing that the president loaned his brother the same sum.
Hunter Biden wrote in a January 2019 message retrieved from his former laptop that he had to give “half” of his income to Joe Biden and the Oversight Committee in May identified nine Biden family members who allegedly received foreign funds.
While vice president, Joe Biden attended two dinners at DC’s Café Milano restaurant in 2014 and 2015 with his son’s patrons from Russia, Kazakhstan and Ukraine, former Hunter Biden business associate Devon Archer told the Oversight Committee on July 31.
Dinner guests who met the then-veep included Vadym Pozharskyi, an adviser to the board of Ukrainian natural gas company Burisma Holdings, which paid Hunter up to $1 million per year beginning in April 2014 to serve on its board as his dad assumed control of the Obama administration’s Ukraine policy.
Hunter Biden stepped away from a gathering in Dubai to “call DC” with Burisma owner Mykola Zlochevsky and Pozharsky in December 2015, Archer also told lawmakers.
An FBI informant file released in July by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said Burisma owner Mykola Zlochevsky claimed in 2016 that he was “coerced” into paying $10 million in bribes to Joe and Hunter Biden in exchange for the then-vice president’s help in ousting Ukrainian prosecutor-general Viktor Shokin.
The bribery claim has not been proven.
Joe Biden additionally was put on speaker phone while vice president during roughly 20 business meetings with Hunter’s foreign associates, including French and Chinese nationals, Archer told the Oversight Committee.
Then-Vice President Biden also met Hunter’s Chinese government-linked business partner Jonathan Li in Beijing in December 2013.
The then-second son cofounded the state-backed investment fund BHR Partners with Li as the firm’s CEO just 12 days after landing in Beijing with his dad on an official visit. Joe Biden later wrote college recommendation letters for Li’s children and later spoke with him on speaker phone during one of Hunter’s subsequent trips to Beijing, Archer said.
Li reportedly loaned the first son $250,000 in July 2019 — three months after Joe Biden launched his presidential campaign — and Hunter allegedly transferred the debt to Hollywood lawyer Kevin Morris, who also allegedly acquired the first son’s 10% stake in BHR Partners late in Biden’s first year as president under conditions that remain unclear.
A text message released in June by House Republicans directly mentions Joe Biden as being involved in the shakedown of a different Chinese government-linked business — CEFC China Energy, which reportedly transferred at least $6.1 million to Hunter and James Biden in 2017 and 2018, shortly after Joe Biden left office as vice president.
Hunter Biden wrote on July 30, 2017, that he was “sitting here with my father” and warned of consequences if the deal was aborted after an initial $1 million in Biden family payments.
“I am sitting here with my father and we would like to understand why the commitment made has not been fulfilled,” Hunter Biden wrote in the WhatsApp message provided to Congress by IRS supervisory agent Gary Shapley.
“Tell the director that I would like to resolve this now before it gets out of hand, and now means tonight,” the now-53-year-old went on, warning he would “make certain that between the man sitting next to me and every person he knows and my ability to forever hold a grudge that you will regret not following my direction.”
“I am sitting here waiting for the call with my father,” reiterated Hunter.
Hunter was at his father’s Wilmington, Del., home on the same day he sent the message.
Within two weeks of the threat, $5.1 million flowed from CEFC to Biden-linked accounts, according to a 2020 report by Republican-led Senate committees.
Hunter and James Biden’s associate James Gilliar wrote in a May 2017 email that partners were considering a 10% cut for Joe Biden and an October 2017 email identifies Joe Biden as a participant in a call about CEFC’s attempt to purchase US natural gas.