CNN Congressional correspondent Melanie Zanona stopped by Friday’s CNN Newsroom to discuss the news that Hallie Biden was one of the beneficiaries of Hunter’s sketch business practices. However, the revelations are mainly a GOP attempt to make Hunter a “liability” for President Joe Biden and there is “no evidence of wrongdoing.”
Co-host Jim Sciutto actually began by admitting Republican allegations are serious:
Republicans on the House Oversight Committee say that financial records show that members of the Biden family indirectly received more than a million dollars from a Chinese company, not clear exactly the details of such records as they make this disturbing allegation. The committee issued a memo yesterday that names -- and this is remarkable -- Hallie Biden, the widow of the president's son Beau Biden, as one of the family members allegedly receiving the money.
Fellow co-host Erica Hill introduced Zanona and asked her “What's the deal with this money?”
Zanona began by reporting that “we already knew that members of Biden's family had received money indirectly from a Chinese-based energy company, but the House Oversight Committee is providing new details about those payments, including, as you mentioned, that one of the recipients was Hallie Biden, she is the widow of Beau Biden, also was romantically involved with Hunter Biden after Beau's death and the House Oversight Committee was able to obtain this information by seeking financial records from a business associate of Hunter Biden.”
She further added that:
Republicans say this raises questions about foreign influence and also whether Biden's family members were using his name to try to make money, but the memo does not link these payments in any way to President Joe Biden. I want to be crystal clear about that and the memo does not show that President Joe Biden while he was vice president used his position to either direct these payments or to try to enrich his own family members in any way, which Republicans have said is the entire purpose of their investigation.”
However, Zanona then started to go off the rails, as she read from a statement from Hunter Biden’s lawyers, ‘“Hunter Biden, a private citizen with every right to pursue his own business endeavors, joined several business partners in seeking a joint venture with a privately-owned legitimate energy company in China. As part of that joint venture, Hunter received his portion of good faith seed funds which he shared with his uncle, James Biden and Hallie Biden with whom he was involved with at the time and sharing expenses.’”
It's China, “privately-owned business” is often a contradiction in terms and nobody is doing business with Hunter Biden because he’s a good businessman.
Despite all of this, Zanona insisted that “Republicans are digging into this issue, they are trying to make this a political liability for President Joe Biden, but so far they have not provided any evidence of wrongdoing.”
At the very least, he hasn’t instilled in Hunter the importance of avoiding the appearance of impropriety. Zanona also avoided wondering why Joe’s name appears in Hunter’s e-mails or how he’s falsely claimed the two have never discussed Hunter’s business dealings.
Sciutto wrapped by thanking Zanona “for that important context,” but replace “Biden” with “Trump” and “China” with “Russia” and CNN would be singing a very different tune.
This segment was sponsored by Nature Made.
Here is a transcript for the March 17 show:
CNN Newsroom
9:17 AM ET
3/17/2023
JIM SCIUTTO: Republicans on the House Oversight Committee say that financial records show that members of the Biden family indirectly received more than a million dollars from a Chinese company, not clear exactly the details of such records as they make this disturbing allegation.
The committee issued a memo yesterday that names -- and this is remarkable -- Hallie Biden, the widow of the president's son Beau Biden, as one of the family members allegedly receiving the money.
ERICA HILL: CNN Congressional correspondent Melanie Zanona joining us now. So, this, of course, goes back to the promises that Republicans had made that they would be investigating Hunter Biden, but how does this line up with those promises? What's the deal with this money?
MELANIE ZANONA: Yeah, so, well, we already knew that members of Biden's family had received money indirectly from a Chinese-based energy company, but the House Oversight Committee is providing new details about those payments, including, as you mentioned, that one of the recipients was Hallie Biden, she is the widow of Beau Biden, also was romantically involved with Hunter Biden after Beau's death and the House Oversight Committee was able to obtain this information by seeking financial records from a business associate of Hunter Biden.
His name is John Robinson Walker, he is someone who Republicans have scrutinized for many years. We know that he did transfer around a million dollars to members of Joe Biden's family after he received $3 million from that Chinese-based energy company.
Republicans say this raises questions about foreign influence and also whether Biden's family members were using his name to try to make money, but the memo does not link these payments in any way to President Joe Biden. I want to be crystal clear about that and the memo does not show that President Joe Biden while he was vice president used his position to either direct these payments or to try to enrich his own family members in any way, which Republicans have said is the entire purpose of their investigation.
And meanwhile, Hunter Biden's legal team says that he pursued these business deals legitimately and he has a right as a private citizen to do that. I want to read you part of the statement from his legal team, they said, “Hunter Biden, a private citizen with every right to pursue his own business endeavors, joined several business partners in seeking a joint venture with a privately-owned legitimate energy company in China. As part of that joint venture, Hunter received his portion of good faith seed funds which he shared with his uncle, James Biden and Hallie Biden with whom he was involved with at the time and sharing expenses.”
So, again, Republicans are digging into this issue, they are trying to make this a political liability for President Joe Biden, but so far they have not provided any evidence of wrongdoing. Jim and Erica?
SCIUTTO: Melanie, thanks for that important context. Thanks very much.
