Politics

White House Confirms That Hunter Biden Will Divest From Chinese Private Equity Firm

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Hunter Biden is in the process of divesting his ownership stake in the Chinese private equity firm BHR Partners, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki confirmed Friday.

The confirmation follows a report from the Daily Caller News Foundation in January that Hunter Biden continues to hold a 10% stake in the firm despite multiple promises from President Joe Biden during his campaign that no one in his family would engage in foreign business if he won the election.

Both the Daily Mail and Fox News reported in late December that Hunter Biden was in the process of offloading his stake in the firm. Both outlets cited an unnamed source with knowledge of Hunter Biden’s business dealings.

However, Hunter Biden continues to own 10% of BHR through his company, Skaneateles LLC, as of Friday, according to Qixinbao and Baidu, two independent services that provide business records on Chinese corporations based on China’s National Credit Information Publicity System.

“He has been working to unwind his investment but I would certainly point you — he’s a private citizen — I would point you to him or his lawyers on the outside,” Psaki said during a press briefing Friday.

It’s unclear if Hunter Biden expects to receive a return on his approximately $420,000 investment in BHR. Hunter Biden’s lawyer, George Mesires did not immediately return a request for comment.

.@PressSec Jen Psaki on Hunter Biden still having a 10% stake in a Chinese investment firm formed with State-owned entities:

“He has been working to unwind his investment.” pic.twitter.com/H9Zq6LT3wQ

— Benny (@bennyjohnson) February 5, 2021

BHR manages the equivalent of $2.1 billion in assets and is co-owned by the Chinese state-controlled Bank of China.

Mesires said in an October 2019 statement that Hunter Biden had not received any return on his investment in BHR.

However, emails located on a copy of Hunter Biden’s alleged laptop show that he was told on multiple occasions by his business partner Eric Schwerin that he could expect to receive significant payments from BHR beginning in 2019.

“BHR is due to have a significant distribution in 2019 because of the CATL exit,” Schwerin told Hunter Biden in a November 2018 email.

In another email the following month, in December 2018, Schwerin told Hunter Biden that he can expect BHR to generate income for him “over the next couple of years.”

Joe Biden promised in October 2019 that nobody in his family would work for foreign companies if he became president.

“No one in my family will have an office in the White House, will sit in on meetings as if they are a cabinet member, will, in fact, have any business relationship with anyone that relates to a foreign corporation or a foreign country,” Joe Biden told reporters in Iowa. “Period. Period. End of story.”

Joe Biden altered his promise after he won the election, saying in December that nobody in his family will “be involved in any business, any enterprise, that is conflicted with or appears to be in conflict, with the appropriate distance from, the presidency and government.”