Hunter Biden showed up unexpectedly Wednesday on Capitol Hill, with a brief but dramatic appearance at a committee hearing as Republicans began the process of holding him in contempt of Congress for violating a subpoena seeking his closed-door testimony.
The president’s son walked through the congressional hallways and sat with his lawyers at the beginning of a meeting of the House Committee on Oversight, which has been seeking his testimony. His presence came a day before he is scheduled to appear in Los Angeles for an arraignment on tax charges.
The committee hearing quickly devolved into a shouting match among committee members, with Republicans railing against Biden for performing “a political stunt” as Democrats yelled back that it was Republicans who were playing politics, given that Biden had appeared and was willing to answer questions under oath in a public setting.
“You are the epitome of White privilege coming into the Oversight Committee, spitting in our face, ignoring a congressional subpoena to be deposed,” said Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.), addressing Biden directly. “What are you afraid of?”
Biden, sitting between his attorney Abbe Lowell and his friend and benefactor Kevin Morris, stared ahead, at times with a look of amusement.
Partway through the hearing, as Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) began speaking, Biden got up and left.
“Apparently you’re afraid of my words,” she said. “What a coward.”
Lowell told reporters outside the hearing room that his client was willing to testify in a public setting. The president’s son has refused to answer Republican House members’ questions behind closed doors, citing a concern that they would selectively leak his remarks to make him look bad.
Hunter Biden made a surprise appearance at a House Oversight Committee hearing on Jan. 10 about whether or not he is in contempt of Congress. (Video: AP)
“Hunter Biden was and is a private citizen,” Lowell said. “Despite this, Republicans have sought to use him as a surrogate to attack his father. And, despite their improper partisan motives, on six difference occasions since February of 2023, we have offered to work with the House committees to see what and how relevant information to any legitimate inquiry could be provided.”
Biden was trailed Wednesday by reporters and other onlookers — some shouting questions such as “Hunter, what’s your favorite kind of crack?” and “Are you on crack today?” — but he largely ignored the questions while making his way to the exit.
His attendance at the hearing came one month after he made another surprise appearance, this one outside the Capitol to deliver remarks to reporters about the ongoing Republican attacks on him.
“For six years, I have been the target of the unrelenting Trump attack machine, shouting, ‘Where’s Hunter?’” he said on Dec. 13. “Well, here’s my answer: I am here.”
The two events mark a more aggressive strategy for Biden. The president’s son for years has faced scrutiny from Republicans, who are using his business dealings as a basis for an impeachment inquiry into his father, and from federal investigators, who have charged Hunter Biden with tax and gun crimes.
The events on Wednesday were the latest turn in a back-and-forth between House Republicans and Biden’s legal team. The committee in November issued a subpoena seeking testimony from Biden on Dec. 13.
He responded that he was willing to testify but only in a public setting. Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), the committee chairman, rejected that offer and said the testimony needed to be in private, with a transcript released afterward. Biden and his allies have repeatedly pointed to past comments from Comer inviting Biden to testify in either a public or private setting.
When Dec. 13 came, Biden instead made his appearance outside the Capitol. The hearing Wednesday began the process of holding him in contempt of Congress for defying the subpoena to appear behind closed doors.
The effort to compel Biden to testify is part a Republican impeachment inquiry into President Biden, although committee investigators have yet to produce direct evidence that the president benefited financially from his son’s foreign business deals.
Tempers flared throughout the Oversight Committee’s hearing, with statements at times verging into personal insults.
When Greene asked to enter unverified materials into the record, Rep. Jamie Raskin (Md.), the panel’s ranking Democrat, reminded her that she could not show pornography — a reference to Greene displaying sexually explicit images of Hunter Biden during a previous hearing. Greene responded that the evidence was not pornography, prompting Raskin to retort that Greene was “the expert.”
A different House panel, the Judiciary Committee, also met Wednesday, in its own push to hold Biden in contempt for ignoring the subpoena to testify privately.
Bitter exchanges also erupted at that hearing, where Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) derided Republicans for saying they wanted to hear from Biden and then refusing to let him answer questions publicly. “Why are you scared?” Lieu said. “What are Republicans hiding from American people?”
Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) himself has defied a congressional subpoena, issued last year by the House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Jordan was not penalized by his colleagues for that choice. During Wednesday’s hearing, Republicans tabled a motion from Democrats to hold both Jordan and Biden in contempt for ignoring their subpoenas.
If the contempt measure against Biden is adopted by the full House, it would fall to the Justice Department to determine whether to indict the president’s son for defying a congressional subpoena. A criminal conviction does not compel an individual to testify but can result in a fine and up to a year of imprisonment.
Last year, the Justice Department indicted former Trump White House official Peter Navarro and White House adviser Stephen K. Bannon after they refused to cooperate with the House Select Committee’s investigation into attack on the Capitol.
But the department declined to pursue charges against two other Trump advisers who were referred for defying subpoenas issued by the bipartisan committee.
