A Plea Agreement
It was announced yesterday that Hunter Biden, the son of the president, would plead guilty to two misdemeanor charges of tax evasion and be placed in a diversion program on a felony charge of lying on a form used to purchase a firearm. As part of the agreement, if he does what he is supposed to, he will serve no jail or prison time.
I’m not going to get into whether he should have faced more charges, or a more significant punishment. Hunter Biden’s lawyer says he believes this resolves all investigations, something the Department of Justice contradicted in a news release.
The bottom line is that at the very least, this will very likely pre-empt additional charges from being filed…charges that could have implicated other Biden family members or the president himself.
Those who wish to have all those business deals investigated, who want confirmation about who “the big guy” is, who want to track down millions of dollars of payments…they’ll all be told to stop piling on, that the president’s son has already admitted to criminal charges, that there’s nothing more to see here.
And that was exactly the point of a plea agreement on the lowest of low hanging fruit…to be able to say there was a conviction, there was accountability…and to try to stop the trail from leading any further. In short, Hunter was the fall guy, the scapegoat…all to protect “the big guy” and everyone else. And even he is not coming out of it too badly.
Many feared this is what would happen…a small pound of flesh, the appearance of holding someone accountable…with the big stuff, the stuff that leads elsewhere, to be buried. Watch for what is actually submitted to the court…does the deal include a provision that the investigation is now complete? These things often do.
That is the main issue…what won’t now be uncovered? And who benefits from that?
