The White House continues to stonewall congressional Republicans who are probing President Joe Biden’s alleged corrupt activities, refusing to provide a transcript of a speech in which he called for the firing of a Ukrainian prosecutor.
On Wednesday, the House Oversight Committee said that the administration has declined to provide the requested drafts of the then-vice president’s December 9, 2015 speech to the Ukrainian Rada where he called for prosecutor general Viktor Shokin to be ousted.
Shokin was at the time probing the Ukrainian energy company that employed Hunter Biden as a board member despite his lack of any experience in the industry, a position that has drawn much scrutiny, including by GOP lawmakers who seek to get to the bottom of the Biden family’s shady foreign business dealings.
Biden later boasted about his using his clout to get Shokin fired. “I said I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money. Well, son of a bitch. He got fired,” Biden recalled during a 2018 panel discussion at a Council on Foreign Relations event.
Diener des Volkes = Ihor Kolomoyskyj (Produzent)
⚡️ Burisma Holdings = Ihor Kolomoyskyi (Inhaber)
Burisma Holdings = Hunter Biden (Aufsichtsrat, $1M/m)
️ Burisma Holdings = Ermittlung durch Generalstaatsanwalt Viktor Shokin
Viktor Shokin = Gefeuert von Joe Biden ($1B) pic.twitter.com/974nhrdvG3— Weltenläufer (@Weltenlaufer) January 30, 2024
“The White House is REFUSING to hand over early drafts of President Biden’s 2015 Ukraine speech where he called for the firing of the Ukrainian prosecutor, Viktor Shokin,” the committee said in a statement that was posted to X.
BREAKING
The White House is REFUSING to hand over early drafts of President Biden’s 2015 Ukraine speech where he called for the firing of the Ukrainian prosecutor, Viktor Shokin.
These drafts are important as it is believed, based on public reporting, that the then-VP… pic.twitter.com/HXuUkVGBAM
— Oversight Committee (@GOPoversight) January 31, 2024
“In his December 2015 speech, then-Vice President Biden called for the firing of the Ukrainian prosecutor, Viktor Shokin, the Ukrainian prosecutor investigating the Ukrainian energy company for which Hunter Biden was on the board of directors. According to public reporting, then-Vice President Biden ‘called an audible’ and changed U.S. policy toward Ukraine to benefit his son on the plane ride to Ukraine. President Biden later bragged about withholding a U.S. loan guarantee if Ukraine did not fire the prosecutor,” the committee stated.
“Chairman Comer requested these documents over five months ago, but the White House has refused to allow NARA to release them to Congress. Within a week of receiving the request, NARA indicated it was able to provide the White House with the full set of documents covering the request for all drafts of then-Vice President Biden’s speech. However, under federal law, NARA must receive White House approval before releasing the documents. For over five months, the White House has refused to authorize the release,” the Oversight Committee statement reads.
House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. James Comer (R-KY), House Judiciary Committee Chairman Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), and House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith (R-MO) sent a letter to White House Counsel Edward Siskel calling for the immediate authorization of the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) to release the drafts.
“For more than five months the White House has declined to authorize the production of these draft speeches to the Oversight Committee or to assert a valid privilege over them. Such a lengthy delay in processing a discrete and limited category of documents is unacceptable and appears to represent an attempt to obstruct the Committees’ legitimate investigation. These dilatory tactics must cease, and the White House must permit NARA to release these documents forthwith … If the White House does not permit the production of these documents, the Oversight Committee will consider the use of compulsory process to require the White House’s production of the speeches,” the GOP chairmen wrote.
“But I can tell you, you cannot name me a single democracy in the world where the cancer of corruption is prevalent. You cannot name me one. They are thoroughly inconsistent. And it’s not enough to set up a new anti-corruption bureau and establish a special prosecutor fighting corruption. The Office of the General Prosecutor desperately needs reform. The judiciary should be overhauled. The energy sector needs to be competitive, ruled by market principles — not sweetheart deals. It’s not enough to push through laws to increase transparency with regard to official sources of income. Senior elected officials have to remove all conflicts between their business interest and their government responsibilities. Every other democracy in the world — that system pertains,” Biden said in the speech, according to the White House archives.
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