Newly released texts from Hunter Biden’s business partner Tony Bobulinski suggest that Joe Biden met the duo, as well as his brother James Biden, as Hunter and his associates pursued a potentially lucrative deal with a Chinese tycoon, complicating claims from the 2020 Democratic nominee that he never discussed business dealings with his son.
The texts are part of a trove of hundreds of documents from Bobulinski obtained by the Washington Examiner, including dozens of WhatsApp messages, emails, letters, business proposals, and more. Bobulinski has provided the records to the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee too. The records are separate from those purportedly on Hunter Biden’s laptop.
In one set of messages, Bobulinski texted Hunter at 11:35 a.m. on Tuesday, May 2, 2017, looking to set up a dinner between himself, Hunter, James, and Joe Biden that evening, saying, “Mrng plse let me know if we will do early dinner w your Uncle & dad and where” before immediately mixing in a bit of business talk, adding, “also for document translation do you want it in simple Chinese or traditional?”
Hunter responded a few minutes later that he was “not sure on dinner yet, and whatever is the most common for a Chinese legal doc.”
That afternoon, Bobulinski said he would be flying out of Los Angeles to New York on Thursday morning, seemingly adding urgency for Hunter to make the meeting happen.
Hunter messaged Bobulinski at 3:56 p.m. saying, “Dad not in now until 11 – lets me I (sic) and Jim meet at 10 at Beverly Hilton where he’s staying.”
A text from Bobulinski to James Biden at 11:40 p.m. that night indicates that the meeting with the former vice president did indeed happen, with Bobulinski saying, “Great to meet u and spend some time together, please thank Joe for his time, was great to talk thx Tony b.”
Joe Biden spoke at the Milken Institute’s Global Conference at the Beverly Hilton on May 3, 2017, and texts indicate that James Biden also helped Bobulinski get credentials to the conference that day. Bobulinski joined James Biden at the conference that day, and texts show they were to meet up again in New York shortly, prior to a trip to Miami to meet up with the Chinese businessmen a couple days after that.
New texts also indicate that Hunter, Bobulinski, James Biden, and other business associates met with Ye Jianming that weekend in Miami. Just over a week later, the “big guy” email, which has been highlighted by the New York Post in the trove of emails it obtained, was sent.
Bobulinski, a former Navy lieutenant who has been invited to be a special guest of President Trump at tonight’s presidential debate, is listed as one of the recipients of a May 13, 2017, email detailing an apparent business deal between a Chinese company and Hunter Biden, and said Thursday that the message is “genuine” and that “the big guy” mentioned is a reference to Hunter’s father, whom he claims Hunter regularly asked for business advice.
“I am the CEO of Sinohawk Holdings, which was a partnership between the Chinese operating through CEFC/Chairman Ye and the Biden family. I was brought into the company to be the CEO by James Gilliar and Hunter Biden. The reference to ‘the Big Guy’ in the much-publicized May 13, 2017 email is, in fact, a reference to Joe Biden. The other ‘JB’ referenced in that email is Jim Biden, Joe’s brother,” Bobulinski said on Thursday. “Hunter Biden called his dad ‘the Big Guy’ or ‘my chairman,’ and frequently referenced asking him for his sign-off or advice on various potential deals that we were discussing. I’ve seen Vice President Biden saying he never talked to Hunter about his business. I’ve seen firsthand that that’s not true because it wasn’t just Hunter’s business, they said they were putting the Biden family name and its legacy on the line.”
In September 2019, after being pressed by Fox News, Joe Biden said, “I have never spoken to my son about his overseas business dealings,” before adding, “here’s what I know. Trump should be investigated.”
Speaking with the New Yorker in July 2019, however, Hunter Biden admitted that he and his father did speak about his business dealings in Ukraine “just once.” Hunter said at the time: “Dad said, ‘I hope you know what you are doing,’ and I said, ‘I do.’”
Joe Biden said, “I don’t know” what Hunter Biden was doing on the board of Burisma when asked by Axios in December 2019, and he said that his son and his brother “will not be engaged in any foreign business” if he is elected president.
The “big guy” email is from James Gilliar, a member of the J2CR international consulting firm, to Hunter Biden and others, dated May 13, 2017, and it discusses “expectations” of a potential deal while claiming that, “we have discussed and agreed the following renumeration packages.” The email notes that “Hunter” would receive “850” ($850,000) and lists him as “Chair/Vice Chair depending on agreement with CEFC” — the China Energy Fund Committee.
CEFC China Energy is a multibillion-dollar Chinese conglomerate founded by Ye Jianming, a Chinese Communist Party-linked business tycoon who has since disappeared in China but with whom Hunter Biden had attempted to work out numerous deals. The email goes on to say that “Hunter has some office expectations he will elaborate” and that “at the moment there’s a provisional agreement that the equity will be distributed as follows,” including “20” (20%) for “H” (Hunter). The email also asks about “10 held by H for the big guy” as well as “10” for “Jim.” Gilliar added that he was “happy to raise any detail with Zang if there is [sic] shortfalls” — a likely reference to Zang Jianjun, the former executive chairman of CEFC.
Neither Hunter nor the Biden campaign have directly disputed the veracity or authenticity of any of the emails or other materials found in a laptop and hard drive that purportedly belonged to Hunter and was left at a Delaware computer shop last year. Hunter Biden’s lawyer did not respond to a request for comment.
Bobulinski spoke at a surprise press conference in Nashville just over an hour before the second and final presidential debate began.
“I have heard Joe Biden say that he has never discussed business with Hunter. That is false. I have firsthand knowledge about this because I directly dealt with the Biden family, including Joe Biden,” Bobulinski said, adding, “On May 2, 2017, the night before Joe Biden was to appear at the Milken Conference, I was introduced to Joe Biden by Jim Biden and Hunter Biden. At my approximately hour-long meeting with Joe that night, we discussed the Bidens’ history and the Biden family’s business plans with the Chinese, with which he was plainly familiar, at least a high level.”
Bobulinski added: “On numerous occasions, it was made clear to me that Joe Biden’s involvement was not to be mentioned in writing, but only face to face. In fact, I was advised by Gilliar and Walker that Hunter and Jim Biden were paranoid about keeping Joe Biden’s involvement secret.”
The Biden campaign denied that Joe Biden had been involved in any family business dealings or any overseas deals.
“Joe Biden has never even considered being involved in business with his family, nor in any overseas business whatsoever,” Biden campaign spokesman Andrew Bates told the Washington Examiner. “He has never held stock in any such business arrangements, nor has any family member, or any other person ever held stock for him.”
The statement from Bates did not address the apparent conflict between Joe Biden’s previous claim that he had never discussed overseas business dealings with Hunter Biden and Bobulinski’s claims that he had discussed a potential China-related business deal with Joe Biden and that the former vice president had been aware of it beforehand.
Homeland Security Chairman Ron Johnson and Finance Chairman Chuck Grassley said Thursday that they were reaching out to all of the recipients of the “big guy” email but that “so far, the committees have received a response only from Mr. Tony Bobulinski, who appears to be willing to fully cooperate with our investigation” and who has agreed to an “informal interview” on Friday.
When Patrick Ho, one of Ye’s lieutenants, was charged by the Justice Department in 2017, the first call he made after his arrest was to Joe Biden’s brother, James, who has said that he thought the call was meant for Hunter. Ho was indicted under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act in the Southern District of New York for his alleged role in a global money laundering and bribery scheme aimed at government officials in Africa. The Justice Department also accused Ho of helping with Iranian sanctions evasion and working to use the Chinese company’s connections to sell weaponry to Chad, Libya, and Qatar. Ho was sentenced to three years in federal prison in March 2019 and was deported to Hong Kong in June.
Ho immediately tried reaching out to the younger Biden for help in 2017 because that summer, Hunter agreed to represent Ho as part of his efforts to work out a liquefied natural gas deal worth tens of millions of dollars with Ye. The vice president’s financier brother, James, said he was surprised by the call from Ho but told the Chinese businessman how to get in touch with his nephew. The lucrative $40 million liquefied natural gas deal Hunter set up with CEFC in Louisiana fell apart when Ye disappeared after being detained by Chinese authorities in 2018.
Kathleen Biden, Hunter Biden’s ex-wife, noted in divorce filings a “large” diamond, worth $80,000, that Biden claimed he had handed off to his associates. In a later interview, he said the diamond, which he claimed was only worth $10,000, was a gift from Ye that he’d received when the two met for the first time in Miami in 2017.
“What would they be bribing me for? My dad wasn’t in office,” Biden told the New Yorker last year. “I knew it wasn’t a good idea to take it. I just felt like it was weird.”
