Special Counsel Changed His Mind on Hunter Biden Plea: NYT
WON’T BACK DOWN
The U.S. attorney overseeing the tax and gun investigation into the president’s son is no longer willing to end the five-year inquiry without securing a guilty plea, according to The New York Times. The newspaper reported Saturday that special counsel David Weiss originally seemed willing to consider closing the Hunter Biden probe without any charges, telling an associate that the average American would not be prosecuted for the violations he was accused of committing. (A senior law enforcement official strongly denied the characterization of the conversation to the Times.) Weiss’ attitude reportedly changed, however, after two IRS officials came forward to accuse the Justice Department of mucking up the investigation. The pair of whistleblowers, at least one of whom felt that Biden was being treated too gently by Weiss, produced a trove of summaries of WhatsApp messages appearing to show Biden invoking his father in what the Times called a “shakedown.” A deferred prosecution agreement for Biden, a highly favorable deal that would have had him agree to never again possess a gun and promise to pay his taxes, that was reportedly on the verge of being inked fell apart several months later.