patrick.net

The “massive bribery scheme” Giuliani is referring to has to do with Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, who held a directorship with a Ukrainian natural gas company called Burisma Holdings in 2014. At one point, Hunter was making $50,000 a month from Burisma. ...

Yoshiko M. Herrera, an expert on Russia and Eurasian policy at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, told the Washington Post that Hunter Biden’s position was “a conflict of interest even if it doesn’t break any laws.”

“Calling Hunter Biden a private citizen ignores the obvious links to the vice president,” Herrera said. “Conflict-of-interest rules should have applied. If Biden is working for the Obama administration on Ukraine, his son should not have been on the board of a company there that could be affected by U.S. policy spearheaded by his father.”

When he was vice president, Mr. Biden cast himself as both the Obama administration’s advocate of military assistance to Kiev as well as the chief antagonist of the notorious corruption in Ukraine’s government. In early 2016, he threatened to withhold $1 billion in American loan guarantees if Ukraine’s top prosecutor was not dismissed after accusations that he had ignored rampant corruption.

Mr. Biden succeeded; the prosecutor general was voted out office. And Hunter Biden had an interest in the outcome: He sat on the board of an energy company that had been in the sights of the ousted prosecutor general.