(WASHINGTON) — A longtime business partner of Hunter Biden, Eric Schwerin, said in a closed-door interview Tuesday with members of the House Oversight Committee that he is “not aware of any financial transactions or compensation” that then-Vice President Joe Biden received related to business conducted by this family members, calling the allegations “preposterous,” according to Schwerin’s opening statement obtained by ABC News.
Schwerin was called the appear before the Oversight Committee as part of the Republican-led impeachment inquiry into the President Joe Biden, for whom Schwerin previously worked as a financial adviser before going into business with his son, Hunter Biden.
“I am not aware of any financial transactions or compensation that Vice President Biden received related to business conducted by any of his family members or their associates nor any involvement by him in their businesses. None,” Schwerin told the committee, according to his statement.
“I cannot recall any requests for Vice President Biden to take any official action on behalf of any of Hunter’s clients or his business deals, foreign or domestic,” Schwerin said. “In fact, I am not aware of any role that Vice President Biden, as a public official or a private citizen, had in any of Hunter’s business activities. None.”
Schwerin, who “managed almost every aspect of [Hunter Biden’s] financial life” for years, according to Kathleen Buhle, Hunter Biden’s ex-wife, in her 2022 memoir, “If We Break,” also told committee members that he never asked President Biden to “take any official actions for the benefit of Hunter’s clients or any other client.”
“Furthermore, I have no recollection of any promises or suggestions made by Hunter or myself to any clients or business associates that his father would take any official actions on their behalf. None,” he said.
According to what Schwerin said he previously told Oversight Committee staff, between 2009 and 2017 he performed a number of administrative and bookkeeping tasks for then-Vice President Joe Biden related to his household finances, and helped him and his accountants in their preparation of his taxes and his annual financial disclosure statements.
Schwerin told the Oversight Committee Tuesday that “in my discussions with the Vice President concerning his personal finances, he was always crystal clear that he wanted to take the most transparent and ethical approach consistent with both the spirit and the letter of the law.”
“Given my awareness of his finances and the explicit directions he gave to his financial advisers, the allegation that he would engage in any improper conduct to benefit himself or his family is preposterous to me,” Schwerin said.
Schwerin is the latest associate of Hunter Biden to speak with the committee, following recent appearances by associates Rob Walker and Kevin Morris.
Republicans have accused President Biden of using his office when he was vice president to “coordinate with Hunter Biden’s business partners about Hunter’s role in Burisma, the Ukrainian energy company,” citing an email exchange between Schwerin and the vice president’s then-communications staffer Kate Bedingfield collaborate on a response to questions from the media about Hunter Biden’s appointment to the board of Burisma.
In response to the allegations by House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, White House spokesperson Ian Sams tweeted in September: “More lies by @JamesComer. As Comer tells it, then-VP Biden ‘colluded’ with this business by … saying he doesn’t endorse it and wasn’t involved with it? Total nonsense.”
Hunter Biden was subpoenaed late last year to sit for a closed-door deposition with the Oversight Committee — a move that Hunter Biden initially resisted but ultimately agreed to earlier this month, under threat of a contempt vote. He is now scheduled to sit with lawmakers in late February.
The Biden impeachment inquiry, launched unilaterally by now-ousted House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and then formalized months later by the House in a party-line vote, has yet to yield any concrete evidence to support GOP claims that Joe Biden participated in and profited from his son and family’s foreign business dealings.
President Biden has denied any wrongdoing.
The younger Biden, meanwhile, is facing unrelated gun and tax charges, to which he has pleaded not guilty. On Tuesday his attorney, Abbe Lowell, filed a series of court papers after special counsel David Weiss earlier this month rebutted his efforts to dismiss the gun charges.
“The filings made by the prosecutors provide more evidence that these charges result from a politically motivated attack instigated by former President Trump and his MAGA allies,” Lowell said in a statement.
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