Comer, the chair of the House Oversight Committee, is leading the congressional investigation into Hunter Biden’s business dealings when his father was vice president. Last week, in an interview, he pointed to an email in which he claimed that Joe Biden was sending a secret message to his son that he was about to fire a Ukrainian prosecutor — a move that supposedly would have furthered his son’s business interests.
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Newsmax flashed an image of the email, sent from an assistant to the vice president to the address of “Robert.L.Peters@pci.gov.” The email listed the vice president’s schedule for the day, including a planned call with the Ukrainian president, who then was Petro Poroshenko. Hunter Biden was copied on the email.
The discovery of this email and Biden’s use of the pseudonym Robert L. Peters led Comer to request from the National Archives and Records Administration all unredacted documents and communications in which Biden used a pseudonym while vice president, as well as any emails in which Hunter Biden or his business associates were copied.
But there’s one big problem with Comer’s claim: The email is dated May 26, 2016. The prosecutor in question had been dismissed by the Ukrainian parliament two months earlier.
The original narrative — documented at the time — was that the European Union, the International Monetary Fund and the United States (along with some Republican senators) believed that Shokin was not acting aggressively to root out corruption, and that Poroshenko needed to remove Shokin to demonstrate he was serious about dealing with a perennial problem in the Ukrainian government. To put pressure on Poroshenko, Biden withheld a promised $1 billion loan guarantee until Shokin was removed.
The alternative narrative, advanced by Republican critics of Biden, is that Shokin was removed at Biden’s behest because he was getting ready to act against the owner of Burisma, a Ukrainian energy firm that had put Hunter Biden on its board. There is little evidence that is the case, as the specific complaint of the international community was that Shokin had failed to act against Burisma. But that has not stopped Republicans like Comer from advancing this alternative narrative, even in the face of new evidence.
For instance, Devon Archer, a fellow Burisma board member, said in a closed-door interview with lawmakers July 31 that he was told at the time of Shokin’s firing that it was a setback for the company, according to a transcript. “That’s what was I told, that it was bad for Burisma,” he said. “But I don’t know. I don’t know if it was good or bad.”
Paradoxically, a key reason for the rise of this alternative narrative was remarks Joe Biden made in 2018 at a Council on Foreign Relations event. He managed to squeeze several months of slow diplomacy into a damaging sound bite: “I looked at them and said, ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money.’ Well, son of a b----. He got fired.” The Trump campaign widely circulated the video during the 2020 campaign, and it continues to resonate with Biden critics.
Comer, in his interview, appears to be counting on his listeners to accept the idea that Biden was acting as a shakedown artist on behalf of his son. He said it was “alarming” that Hunter was copied on the email. He asked: “Why was he receiving emails about Ukrainian policy right before they were going to fire that prosecutor?”
It’s a nonsensical question. Here’s a quick timeline of Shokin’s firing. Keep in mind that the email is dated May 26, 2016.
Sept. 24, 2015: U.S. Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt makes a speech in Ukraine in which he blasts the prosecutor’s office for “openly and aggressively undermining reform” and having “undermined prosecutors working on legitimate corruption cases.”
Dec. 8: Vice President Biden addresses the Ukrainian parliament and decries the “cancer of corruption” in the country. “The Office of the General Prosecutor desperately needs reform,” he says. In a meeting with Poroshenko the day before, Biden had linked granting the loan guarantee to Shokin’s ouster.
Jan. 20, 2016: Biden meets with Poroshenko on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. He emphasizes “the need to continue to move forward on Ukraine’s anti-corruption agenda,” according to a White House statement.
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Newsmax flashed an image of the email, sent from an assistant to the vice president to the address of “Robert.L.Peters@pci.gov.” The email listed the vice president’s schedule for the day, including a planned call with the Ukrainian president, who then was Petro Poroshenko. Hunter Biden was copied on the email.
The discovery of this email and Biden’s use of the pseudonym Robert L. Peters led Comer to request from the National Archives and Records Administration all unredacted documents and communications in which Biden used a pseudonym while vice president, as well as any emails in which Hunter Biden or his business associates were copied.
But there’s one big problem with Comer’s claim: The email is dated May 26, 2016. The prosecutor in question had been dismissed by the Ukrainian parliament two months earlier.
The Facts
As we have noted before, there are two narratives about the dismissal of Viktor Shokin, the former Ukrainian prosecutor general.The original narrative — documented at the time — was that the European Union, the International Monetary Fund and the United States (along with some Republican senators) believed that Shokin was not acting aggressively to root out corruption, and that Poroshenko needed to remove Shokin to demonstrate he was serious about dealing with a perennial problem in the Ukrainian government. To put pressure on Poroshenko, Biden withheld a promised $1 billion loan guarantee until Shokin was removed.
The alternative narrative, advanced by Republican critics of Biden, is that Shokin was removed at Biden’s behest because he was getting ready to act against the owner of Burisma, a Ukrainian energy firm that had put Hunter Biden on its board. There is little evidence that is the case, as the specific complaint of the international community was that Shokin had failed to act against Burisma. But that has not stopped Republicans like Comer from advancing this alternative narrative, even in the face of new evidence.
For instance, Devon Archer, a fellow Burisma board member, said in a closed-door interview with lawmakers July 31 that he was told at the time of Shokin’s firing that it was a setback for the company, according to a transcript. “That’s what was I told, that it was bad for Burisma,” he said. “But I don’t know. I don’t know if it was good or bad.”
Paradoxically, a key reason for the rise of this alternative narrative was remarks Joe Biden made in 2018 at a Council on Foreign Relations event. He managed to squeeze several months of slow diplomacy into a damaging sound bite: “I looked at them and said, ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money.’ Well, son of a b----. He got fired.” The Trump campaign widely circulated the video during the 2020 campaign, and it continues to resonate with Biden critics.
Comer, in his interview, appears to be counting on his listeners to accept the idea that Biden was acting as a shakedown artist on behalf of his son. He said it was “alarming” that Hunter was copied on the email. He asked: “Why was he receiving emails about Ukrainian policy right before they were going to fire that prosecutor?”
It’s a nonsensical question. Here’s a quick timeline of Shokin’s firing. Keep in mind that the email is dated May 26, 2016.
Sept. 24, 2015: U.S. Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt makes a speech in Ukraine in which he blasts the prosecutor’s office for “openly and aggressively undermining reform” and having “undermined prosecutors working on legitimate corruption cases.”
Dec. 8: Vice President Biden addresses the Ukrainian parliament and decries the “cancer of corruption” in the country. “The Office of the General Prosecutor desperately needs reform,” he says. In a meeting with Poroshenko the day before, Biden had linked granting the loan guarantee to Shokin’s ouster.
Jan. 20, 2016: Biden meets with Poroshenko on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. He emphasizes “the need to continue to move forward on Ukraine’s anti-corruption agenda,” according to a White House statement.