Topline
Jury selection begins Thursday for the second criminal trial of Hunter Biden, who faces tax charges alleging he failed to pay over $1 million in federal taxes, months after President Joe Biden’s son was convicted on charges stemming from the unlawful purchase of a firearm.
A jury convicted Biden on federal gun charges earlier this year.
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Key Facts
Hunter Biden was indicted in Los Angeles federal court in December on felony charges of tax evasion, filing a false personal tax return and filing a false corporate tax return, and six misdemeanor charges for failing to pay and file taxes on time.
His indictment, filed by special prosecutor David Weiss’s office, alleges Hunter Biden schemed to avoid paying more than $1.4 million in taxes between 2016 and 2019 as he spent millions on an “extravagant lifestyle rather than paying his tax bills.”
Prosecutors allege Hunter Biden earned more than $7 million in “gross total income” between 2016 and 2020.
The indictment also alleges Hunter Biden—who pleaded not guilty to the charges—“willfully failed” to file his tax returns for 2017 and 2018 on time and included false business deductions in his 2018 return to “evade assessment of taxes” to reduce the “substantial” tax liabilities he faced as of February 2020.
Mark Geragos, Hunter Biden’s attorney, has attributed Hunter Biden’s failure to pay his taxes to his alcohol and cocaine addictions, which he said impaired his ability to act responsibly, and noted he eventually paid the taxes he missed—though Judge Mark Scarsi ruled his attorneys cannot tell the jury this.
Prosecutors argued while Hunter Biden paid the taxes later on, the charges still detail a multi-year scheme to spend millions of dollars instead of paying his taxes.
He could face up to 17 years in prison and up to $750,000 in fines if convicted—though defendants usually get significantly less than the maximum sentence.
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Tangent
The trial is expected to include income from Hunter Biden’s foreign business deals, including the millions he earned while serving on the board for the Ukrainian firm Burisma Holdings Limited, among other transactions, according to court filings. House Republicans have long criticized the younger Biden’s business deals and attempted to link his father to them—and have accused the DOJ of not properly investigating them. Despite years of investigation, however, lawmakers have not found hard evidence indicating Joe Biden made money off the deals or directly intervened on his son’s behalf.
Key Background
An investigation into Hunter Biden’s taxes was launched by the Internal Revenue Service in 2018. Hunter Biden previously agreed to plead guilty to two less severe misdemeanor tax charges in a deal that also included a separate charge of purchasing a gun while using drugs. Hunter Biden has openly discussed his earlier addictions, indicating he began abusing alcohol while in high school and later began using cocaine while in college, and said he checked into rehabilitation centers at least five times. As part of his plea agreement, Hunter Biden would plead guilty to the two tax charges and enter a diversion program. That deal dissolved in July 2023 due to a disagreement between Biden’s lawyers and federal prosecutors over whether Hunter Biden would be immune from additional charges. The two tax misdemeanors were dismissed last August before he was indicted on the nine charges in December.
What To Watch For
A jury convicted Hunter Biden in June of three federal felonies for unlawfully purchasing a gun while he was addicted to drugs in 2018. His sentencing is scheduled for Nov. 13—just after the presidential election—and he faces a maximum sentence of 25 years in prison and up to $750,000 in fines (though he will likely get nowhere near the maximum).
Further ReadingForbesHere Are The Tax Charges Hunter Biden Faces After Federal Gun Trial ConvictionBy Cailey Gleeson
Forbes9 Federal Tax Charges Filed Against Hunter BidenBy Antonio Pequeño IV
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Publish date : 2024-09-05 03:49:00
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