Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY) is urging House Republicans to publish their transcribed interview with Devon Archer, a former business partner of Hunter Biden, arguing the public release would exonerate the Biden administration from any allegations of international influence peddling.
Goldman’s comments come just days after Archer appeared before lawmakers, the latest step in a highly watched investigation into the business dealings of the president’s son. Goldman was the only member to stay for the entirety of the five-hour interview, during which the New York Democrat said Republicans failed to provide “a shred of evidence” of any wrongdoing.
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“There is no connection. No proof, no facts, no evidence, no matter what they want to say [or] how they want to spin it,” Goldman said during a conversation with the Congressional Integrity Project on Wednesday. “There's no evidence from witnesses or documents that Joe Biden had any connection to Hunter Biden's business dealings overseas.”
Goldman has called on Oversight Committee leaders to release the transcript as soon as possible, noting the public release is crucial to ensure lawmakers don’t misrepresent their findings.
“I have been urging the chairman to turn that transcript around and release it. They can do that very quickly,” Goldman said. “And if they don't, it is a reflection that they do not want the American people to see the full testimony, and they want to cherry-pick and misrepresent specific aspects of that testimony to continue their misinformation campaign.”
Oversight Republicans have pushed back on Goldman’s demands, noting the release of transcripts can be a lengthy process. However, GOP lawmakers have vowed to publish the interview once it’s available.
“First, we need to receive it from the court reporters (we haven’t yet!), and then the witness gets the chance to review it,” Oversight Republicans said in a statement. “Once that process has happened, we will release the transcript. Also, no one believes Joe only talked about the weather.”
Archer testified behind closed doors on Monday to answer lawmakers' questions about the alleged involvement of President Joe Biden in his son's foreign business dealings, during which he revealed that Biden had been present for at least 20 phone calls with Hunter Biden's business associates. However, Archer noted the conversations did not pertain to official business but were merely social in nature, such as the weather.
“The witness made very clear that Joe Biden had no interest in any of the business transactions, never received any money, never had any influence over the business decisions,” Goldman said. “What the witness described was outside pressure. The Burisma executives urged Hunter to try to use whatever influence he had … This is something that I think has been misconstrued. That was simply an illusion. He had no actual influence. The witness was clear about that.”
However, Republicans interpreted Archer’s testimony through a different lens, citing it as evidence that Hunter Biden had received money from China and that Joe Biden lied about knowing details of his son's dealings.
Goldman’s comments come one day after a grand jury voted to indict former President Donald Trump in relation to his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, which the New York Democrat said he believes is “interrelated.” Several GOP leaders openly questioned the timing of special counsel Jack Smith's legal charges, accusing the Justice Department of using the indictment as a distraction from Hunter Biden’s own legal woes.
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Trump was indicted by a grand jury on four separate federal charges: one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States, one count of conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, one count of obstruction and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding and one count of conspiracy against rights.
“They are interconnected because there is a very concerted and intentional effort by House Republicans to support Donald Trump in any way that they can,” Goldman said.”We've seen many of the extremist Republicans in the House rally around this concept of election interference in terms of the various investigations of Donald Trump and this bogus notion of some sort of two-tiered system of justice. And so, it's all interrelated.”