The president will fly to Wilmington, Delaware, on Sunday evening and spend the day without official business there, where his 54-year-old son’s felony firearms trial begins Monday.
Joe Biden’s looming presence in this strange little town leaves no one in doubt about the message he’s sending to Delaware Special Counsel David Weiss, the prosecutors, the judge and the potential jurors who will be selected on Monday: If you play with my son, you play with me.
It’s all done in a very subtle yet blatant way, much like Joe’s surprise visit to Hallie Biden, Beau’s widow and Hunter’s ex-girlfriend, just nine days before her son’s trial, where Hallie is the prosecution’s main witness.
In October 2018, it was Harry who, concerned about Hunter’s mental health due to his drug addiction, threw Hunter’s new gun in the trash, creating a time bomb that would land Hunter in court six years later.
Harry was found to have found drugs and drug paraphernalia in his truck. Harry, 50, has previously revealed he was addicted to crack cocaine, during which he had multiple stints in drug rehab.
“Biden’s words”?
Harry’s perception of his drug use will be key to his trial on charges that he lied on a federal background check form at a gun store by answering “no” to the question, “Are you an illegal user of, or addicted to, various drugs?” on October 12, 2018. Hunter’s defense is that the day he bought the gun was a rare day when he was drug-free during a period in which he admitted in his autobiography, “Beautiful Things,” that he was “smoking crack cocaine every 15 minutes.”
Joe’s late-night visit to Harry clearly constituted possible witness tampering and must have infuriated the prosecutors, Wise’s brilliant lieutenants Leo Wise and Derek Hines.
But again, we are commanded to take Joe’s “Biden word” that nothing untoward happened.
Joe’s constant string of family tragedies was invoked to explain the visit, which comes shortly after the anniversary of Beau Biden’s death and has not featured a major late-night visit by the president on any previous anniversary.
Joe and Harry didn’t even have to discuss the trial in their 15-minute closed-door meeting.
The president’s unexpected attendance said it all.
As part of this smart man message, Hunter has been seen in public with his father more often over the past two weeks.
Hunter was seen wagging his finger at White House staff and attending events in the Rose Garden.
He would hop on and off Marine One and Air Force One with his father, flying long weekends from Washington to Wilmington to Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, and back again, hopping on and off the presidential motorcade with a Secret Service escort in tow.
A new scene unfolded Saturday morning, as Hunter rode his bike with his father in Rehoboth, trailing close behind as they passed waiting media.
Perhaps most egregiously, First Son rubbed shoulders with Attorney General Merrick Garland at a state dinner for the Kenyan president on May 23rd, where he was also indicted.
Also in attendance were 12 Biden family members and entourage, including Hunter’s three daughters, his niece, and his boyfriend and husband.
This marks the second official dinner Merrick Garland has attended with Hunter at a key moment in his eldest son’s legal battle.
Last year, before an IRS whistleblower exposed the corruption of the Justice Department and the CIA obstructing Hunter’s five-year criminal tax evasion investigation, Hunter cut a sweet plea deal with Weiss, then a mediocre U.S. attorney for Delaware, and days later was strolling triumphantly around at a state dinner for the Indian prime minister, while Garland, in a penguin costume, carefully tried to keep a low profile between the two.
The impression was so bad that one would think Garland, who claims to be a stickler for decorum, would recuse himself from all future state dinners and White House parties in which Hunter would be present.
But just days before Hunter’s gun trial, he showed up here again.
The Attorney General should have recused himself from the dinner, asserting his integrity and expressing his condemnation of the President’s underground manipulation, which is not proper or normal, no matter what anyone says.
Joe Biden claims to have restored integrity and dignity to the White House, but there is nothing about his presidency that is not appropriate or normal.
This is simply an extension of the fraudulent privileges he and his family have enjoyed in the tiny, incestuous state he has ruled for 50 years.
Two Exams
Indeed, if he were to show up Monday at the Caleb J. Boggs Courthouse in Wilmington, glaring at District Judge Maryellen Noreika and watching the jury be sworn in, media advocates would likely rush to his defense, saying he was only there to support his surviving son.
Ethics take a back seat in a situation where Joe’s enduring tragedy is easily denied.
In the shadow of President Trump’s guilty verdict, Hunter’s trial has taken on a politically charged role, even though it is the only charge in the five-year criminal investigation compromise that does not touch on Joe.
In contrast, Hunter’s California tax trial, scheduled for September, is high-stakes for Joe because the trial covers 2014 and 2015, when Hunter made $1 million from Burisma and his father, a vice president, fired the Ukrainian prosecutor who was investigating the corrupt energy company.
But if Hunter is acquitted in his Delaware gun trial, Joe will have a clever talking point to present to Trump in their first debate: “My son was tried by the very system you claim is being weaponized against him. Unlike you, a jury acquitted my son.”
Hunter’s high-priced lawyer, Abe Lowell, is a master at manipulating juries, so even considering the low chances of a defendant winning in a federal trial, there’s a chance Hunter will be acquitted.
