House Democrats published a report Thursday showing former President Donald Trump received at least $7.8 million from foreign sources, a smaller total than the Biden family.
Democratic Maryland Rep. Jamie Raskin, ranking member of the House Oversight Committee, released the Trump report and accused House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer of fighting his attempts to obtain business records for the report. (RELATED: Here Are The Five Biggest Hunter Biden Stories Of The Past Year)
TRUMP REPORT:
“President Trump’s businesses received, at a minimum, $7.8 million in foreign payments from at least 20 countries during his presidency. These included payments from foreign governments and foreign government-owned or -controlled entities to properties owned by Donald Trump,” the report reads.
The $7.8 million figure listed in the Trump report is less than the $15 million Biden family members made from roughly 2014-19 during and after Joe Biden’s vice presidency, according to a memo circulated in September by House Republicans. (RELATED: Hunter Biden’s Drug Addiction Defense Shattered By New California Indictment)
In total, the Biden family and its business associates hauled in more than $24 million from Ukraine, Russia, China, Romania and Kazakhstan over that time period, the memo states. The House Oversight Committee has produced bank records showing the transactions between Biden family members and foreign business partners from those respective nations.
IMPEACHMENT INQUIRY MEMO:
“It’s beyond parody that Democrats continue their obsession with former President Trump. Former President Trump has legitimate businesses but the Bidens do not. The Bidens and their associates made over $24 million by cashing in on the Biden name in China, Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and Romania. No goods or services were provided other than access to Joe Biden and the Biden network,” Comer said in a statement provided to the Daily Caller.
Trump’s business ventures are all under the Trump Organization banner, a holding company owned by Donald Trump. When he was president, his sons Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr. ran the multinational business conglomerate.
The Chinese government and state-owned enterprises poured at least $5.5 million into Trump-owned properties during his presidency from 2017-21, the report shows. Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, a Chinese state-owned commercial bank, spent an estimated $5.3 million on lease space inside Trump Tower after first becoming a tenant of Trump’s in 2008.
Saudi Arabia, Qatar, India and Kuwait are among the foreign nations that paid Trump entities six figure sums while he was in the White House, the report says. House Oversight Committee Democrats have also released the financial records cited in the report.
TRUMP RECORDS:
Mazars USA LLC, Trump’s former accounting firm, produced the financial records used to created the report after a lengthy legal fight between House Democrats, Mazars and Trump’s attorneys. Rep. Raskin’s report accuses Comer of working with Trump’s attorneys to terminate the committee’s fight for records after Republicans regained control of the House.
“While the figures and constitutional violations in this report are shocking, we still don’t know the extent of the foreign payments that Donald Trump received—or even the total number of countries that paid him and his businesses while he was President—because Committee Chairman James Comer and House Republicans buried any further evidence of the Trump family’s staggering corruption,” Raskin said in a statement. He also issued a response to Rep. Comer’s statement on the Trump report.
“Meantime, Chairman Comer casually admits that Donald Trump was in business while president of the United States, which is precisely what is unlawful when it involves collection of millions of dollars from foreign governments and monarchs,” Raskin stated.
“After a year of his embarrassing wild goose chase, obsessively focused on President Biden’s son, a private citizen who never served in his father’s Administration, Comer cannot identify any wrongdoing by President Biden, let alone a single monetary payment he has received from a foreign government.”
Comer is one of the Republican lawmakers leading the impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden based on the Biden family’s business enterprise and IRS whistleblower testimony about improper conduct during the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) ongoing criminal investigation into Hunter Biden.
WASHINGTON, DC – DECEMBER 13: House Oversight and Accountability Committee Chairman James Comer (R-KY) walks to a hearing room in the Rayburn House Office Building on December 13, 2023 in Washington, DC. U.S. President Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden defied a subpoena from Congress to testify behind closed doors ahead of a House vote on an impeachment inquiry against his father. (Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
Raskin has frequently defended Joe Biden during the impeachment inquiry and claimed House Republicans have not implicated Joe Biden in any wrongdoing.
“After nearly a year of investigating, House Republicans have collected an extraordinary amount of evidence in their investigation of Hunter Biden’s business activities. And this evidence comes on top of the evidence collected by Senate Republicans who conducted their own investigation of Hunter Biden in 2020. There is no lack of evidence—and the evidence shows no wrongdoing by President Biden, let alone an impeachable offense,” House Oversight Committee Dems said in a Dec. 1 memo.
Democrats previously circulated a memo Sept. 27 designed to counter the IRS whistleblower allegations about the conduct of special counsel David Weiss and his staff in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Delaware.
House Republicans released a report Dec. 5 detailing how witness testimony confirmed major allegations about the Hunter Biden case brought forward by IRS whistleblowers Gary Shapley and Joseph Ziegler.
Raskin has insisted Republicans have used “conspiracy theories” to smear both Hunter and Joe Biden, but also accused Hunter Biden of violating the law
Comer and House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan have said they will initiate contempt of congress proceedings against Hunter Biden for defying a subpoena to appear for a deposition before congress. He chose to stage a press conference on Capitol Hill and repeat his offer to testify publicly instead of complying with the subpoena.
“Let me state as clearly as I can: My father was not financially involved in my business, not as a practicing lawyer, not as a board member of Burisma. Not in my partnership with a Chinese private businessman. Not my investments at home nor abroad and certainly not as an artist,” he asserted at the press conference.
Hunter: “Let me state as clearly as I can: My father was not financially involved in my business, not as a practicing lawyer, not as a board member of Burisma. Not in my partnership with a Chinese private businessman. Not my investments at home nor abroad and certainly not as an… pic.twitter.com/NWgBrfm7ux
— Greg Price (@greg_price11) December 13, 2023
Hunter Biden had lucrative business arrangements during the Trump presidency after his father left office. In March 2017, Chinese firm CEFC sent Hunter Biden’s business associate Rob Walker $3 million through its State Energy HK account, bank records released by the Oversight Committee show.
The younger Biden received roughly $1 million of the State Energy HK funds, as confirmed by his federal tax indictment in California. He made additional income in 2017 and 2018 from Hudson West III, a business entity he formed with CEFC associates.
The California indictment shows Hunter Biden’s relationship with CEFC began in October 2015, when Joe Biden was vice president. Walker told the FBI in December 2020 that Joe Biden met with CEFC associates after he left office.
Comer released bank records Nov. 1 showing how funds from China flowed from Hunter Biden’s Chinese business associates through multiple Biden family accounts, resulting in a $40,000 check to Joe Biden in September 2017.
The check, written by Joe Biden’s sister-in-law Sara Biden, is classified as a loan repayment. The White House has said the check was intended to repay a loan Joe Biden sent his brother James. (RELATED: IRS Whistleblowers Unable To ‘Verify’ Loans White House Claims Joe Biden Sent To Family Members, Testimony Shows)
Hunter Biden, son of US President Joe Biden, leaves the J. Caleb Boggs Federal Building in Wilmington, Delaware, on July 26, 2023. Hunter Biden pleaded not guilty to minor tax offenses on July 26, as a deal with federal prosecutors fell apart in a Delaware court. The surprise reversal of Biden’s agreement last month to settle the charges came after Judge Maryellen Noreika raised questions about the complicated deal that would also settle a separate gun charge against the president’s son, US media reported. (Photo by RYAN COLLERD / AFP) (Photo by RYAN COLLERD/AFP via Getty Images)
Ukrainian energy firm Burisma Holdings significantly reduced Hunter Biden’s salary after his father left office, the indictment shows. Hunter Biden’s Burisma salary was $83,333.333 per month, roughly $1 million annually, when Joe Biden was handling the Obama administration’s Ukraine policy, bank records show.
The Biden family “brand” protected Burisma from legal scrutiny, Hunter Biden’s former business associate and former Burisma board member Devon Archer told the House Oversight Committee in July testimony. (RELATED: Hunter Biden’s Fixer Is Reportedly Backing Documentary About His Life)
Archer recalled around 20 instances where Joe Biden spoke with his son’s business associates, such as a spring 2014 dinner with Russian oligarch Elena Baturina and a spring 2015 dinner with Burisma executive Vadim Pozharskyi.
The president denied meeting with his son’s business associates Dec. 6, the day after email data showed Joe Biden exchanged more than 50 private communications with Hunter Biden’s former business associate Eric Schwerin.
“I’m not going to comment on that. I did not. It’s just a bunch of lies,” Joe Biden told New York Post reporter Steven Nelson.
Hunter Biden was indicated in December on nine federal tax charges in California for allegedly failing to pay over $1 million worth of taxes over the 2016-19 tax years where he made over $7 million in gross income.
His arraignment is scheduled for Jan. 11.
Henry Rodgers contributed to this report