A former bookkeeper for the Biden family touted by Republicans as a whistleblower failed to blow the lid off the GOP-led impeachment inquiry on Tuesday, telling members of the House Oversight Committee a closed-door hearing that he’d never seen any evidence that the president had enriched himself through his son’s international business deals.
The witness, Eric Schwerin, also a longtime business partner to Hunter Biden, acted as a financial adviser to Joe Biden from 2009 to 2017, performing various administrative and bookkeeping tasks for the then-vice president. Schwerin also helped Biden prepare his taxes and annual financial disclosure statements, and had access to his bank records.
“Based on that insight,” Schwerin said in his opening statement to the committee, “I am not aware of any financial transactions or compensation that Vice President Biden received related to business conducted by any of his family members or their associates nor any involvement by him in their businesses.”
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“In fact,” he added shortly after, “I am not aware of any role that Vice President Biden, as a public official or a private citizen, had in any of Hunter’s business activities. None.”
Schwerin called Republican claims of Biden’s corruption “preposterous,” saying that Biden had “always” been “crystal clear” in private discussions that he wanted to take the most transparent, ethical approach to his personal finances.
Schwerin was previously interviewed by Oversight Committee staff last March, when he told them much the same, according to Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD), the ranking member of the committee.
“House Republicans are about to begin the 14th month of this Trump-demanded fishing expedition,” Raskin added in a statement. “They have uncovered a mountain of evidence discrediting their own allegations, and they have failed to uncover any evidence of wrongdoing by President Biden whatsoever, much less an impeachable offense. Yet, Republicans have devoted more than a year to circulating lies and conspiracy theories in service of Donald Trump’s demands for political retribution and vengeance.”
Republicans have repeatedly accused President Biden of wielding political power to help his son in his dealings overseas, including in Ukraine, where—as the debunked conspiracy theory goes—he allegedly leaned on the government to prevent a corruption investigation into the Burisma gas company and protect Hunter, who sat on its board.
In speaking with the committee on Tuesday, Schwerin specified that Biden never took any action related to Ukraine to help Hunter’s work. Still, House Republicans spent hours questioning him about Burisma, according to a congressional source with direct knowledge of the interview.
Biden has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing in the matter.
Despite having interviewed Biden’s former executive assistant and at least two other associates of Hunter’s, Republican lawmakers have yet to produce any evidence of his supposed corruption and influence peddling.
Hunter himself is scheduled to answer questions in an Oversight hearing in late February, an interview he agreed to after resisting an initial subpoena and being threatened with a contempt vote.
