Hunter Biden’s Work in Romania Raise New Pay-To-Play Concerns
An American lawyer flew to Romania in the final year of the Obama administration to meet with a businessman accused of orchestrating a fraudulent land sale.
The businessman was a rich Romanian real estate tycoon, Gabriel “Puiu” Popoviciu. According to two individuals familiar with the matter, the lawyer brought Hunter Biden, the son of then-Vice President Joe Biden to advise him.
In the past couple of days Chief of Staff Mark Meadows teased a fresh scandal involving the Biden family and Romania.
Money from Romania, Ukraine and China appears to ‘flowing to the Biden family broadly,’ Meadows said.
Hunter Biden’s international business interests spread to Romania as well as China and Ukraine, and Americans should expect to hear more “in the days to come,” Meadows said on Fox Business Network’s The Evening Edit.
The Wall Street Journal is currently preparing a story on the dealings of Hunter Biden, but it was not immediately clear if that was what Meadows was referring to.
Meadows told host Elizabeth MacDonald,
“I find it fascinating that some of the monies that appear to be flowing to the Biden family broadly come from Romania, from Ukraine, and from China, the very three countries that Joe Biden was special envoy to [as vice president].”
– Mark Meadows
The chief of staff added that Joe Biden, now the president’s Democratic candidate, is going to have “a lot of explanation to do.” Joe Biden has consistently avoided speaking about his son’s overseas business interests that appear at face value to sell access to the Vice President.
The deal, government ethics experts say, poses questions that in Popoviciu’s attempt to dodge criminal charges, Hunter Biden was used as a prop.
“We don’t know what [Hunter Biden] was paid or what he was paid for but it does raise questions of whether this Romanian individual facing criminal charges was actually paying for a connection to the American vice president,” said Kathleen Clark, a Washington University law professor who specializes in government ethics.