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Michael Ginsberg(Daily Caller)
The Treasury Department will allow members of the House Oversight and Government Accountability Committee to review Suspicious Activities Reports (SARs) detailing Hunter Biden’s bank records, committee chairman James Comer of Kentucky said Tuesday.
The Oversight Committee initially requested in January that Treasury officials provide Biden’s SARs, which are taken by banks in accordance with federal law when deposits or withdrawals exceed $10,000 or may indicate criminal activity. Assistant Treasury Secretary for Legislative Affairs Jonathan Davidson responded that the Oversight Committee did not identify a purpose for the request. Comer believes that Treasury holds more than 150 reports on Biden.
“After two months of dragging their feet, the Treasury Department is finally providing us with access to the suspicious activity reports for the Biden family and their associates’ business transactions. It should never have taken us threatening to hold a hearing and conduct a transcribed interview with an official under the penalty of perjury for Treasury to finally accommodate part of our request,” Comer said in a statement.
The Treasury Department changed a rule to limit the ability of minority party members to request SARs, Comer asserted in July 2022. He argued that the department made the change to limit Republican investigations into Hunter Biden.
“We are going to continue to use bank documents and suspicious activity reports to follow the money trail to determine the extent of the Biden family’s business schemes, if Joe Biden is compromised by these deals, and if there is a national security threat. If Treasury tries to stonewall our investigation again, we will continue to use tools at our disposal to compel compliance,” Comer added.
The Lion Hall Group, a company controlled by Hunter’s uncle James Biden, paid Hunter Biden a $100,000 monthly retainer. Those payments were reportedly flagged, as was a $100,000 payment from Chinese billionaire Ye Jianming to Owasco, Hunter Biden’s law firm.
Large payments to “politically-exposed people” like Hunter Biden can be part of “malign foreign influence campaigns,” Federal Bureau of Investigation Director Christopher Wray testified in August 2022.
“It starts to shade into a blend of what we call malign foreign influence with potential public corruption. And it’s something we take seriously,” he told Republican Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley.
