Republicans are opening an impeachment inquiry into U.S. President Joe Biden. Here’s what to know

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In July, 2019, then-U.S. President Donald Trump asked his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelensky, for a “favour.” Mr. Trump wanted Mr. Zelensky to announce an investigation into whether Joe Biden had used his influence as vice-president to help the Ukrainian business interests of his son, Hunter. The White House withheld almost US$400-million in military aid to Kyiv to put pressure on Mr. Zelensky to comply.

That telephone call led to Mr. Trump’s first impeachment later that year. The President had, congressional Democrats argued, abused the authority of his office in a bid to coerce a foreign government into helping him tarnish a political opponent.

Now, Mr. Trump’s Republican allies in Congress are working to impeach Mr. Biden over the same narrative Mr. Trump pushed with Mr. Zelensky: that Mr. Biden wielded his power to help his son make money. They have so far turned up no evidence of this. But the proceedings introduce a wild card into the 2024 presidential race, in which Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump look set to face off again, just as Mr. Trump is preparing for four criminal trials.

“These are allegations of abuse of power, obstruction and corruption,” House Speaker Kevin McCarthy declared this week as he announced the impeachment investigation. “It appears that the President’s family has been offered special treatment.”

What did Hunter Biden do exactly?

The President’s second son is a lobbyist and businessman with a history of foreign dealings. Among other things, he sat on the boards of Burisma, a Ukrainian oil and gas company, and BHR Partners, a Chinese private equity firm. Both companies are controversial. Burisma was embroiled in corruption and tax-evasion investigations, and BHR has done business with companies owned by the Chinese government.

The younger Mr. Biden faces a string of legal problems, related both to his businesses and his drug use.

Court records show he failed to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxes in 2017 and 2018, despite earning more than US$4.5-million in those years. Two Internal Revenue Service agents who have spoken to congressional investigators say he used a shell company arrangement to avoid paying taxes on income from Burisma and claimed payments for prostitutes as business expenses.

He has also been indicted on two firearms charges for buying a handgun in 2018 while he was regularly smoking crack cocaine.

How is Joe Biden tied into this?

Hunter Biden’s former business partners have said he traded on his famous father’s name to impress associates. For instance, he used to take calls from his father in front of colleagues and put him on speakerphone. While the elder Mr. Biden was Vice-President, he also met with some of his son’s associates in person, including over dinner and at the White House.

There is no evidence that these discussions went beyond pleasantries. “There was no business conversation,” Devon Archer, one of Hunter’s former business partners, told a congressional committee this summer. “It was just general niceties and conversation in general, about the geography, about the weather, whatever it may be.”

Mr. Archer also poured cold water on a claim by an FBI informant that the founder of Burisma paid Joe Biden US$5-million.

The specific claim Mr. Trump wanted Mr. Zelensky to investigate in 2019 was that the elder Mr. Biden had gotten a Ukrainian prosecutor, Viktor Shokin, fired in order to shut down an investigation into Burisma. Mr. Shokin, however, does not appear to have actually been conducting such an investigation. Britain’s Serious Fraud Office froze some of the company’s assets as a prelude to a corruption probe but had to drop the investigation because Mr. Shokin would not co-operate.

More recently, the Republicans have accused federal prosecutors of giving the younger Mr. Biden a “sweetheart plea deal” on his criminal charges. This past summer, he agreed to plead guilty to two tax-related offences and enter a probation program in exchange for having the gun charge withdrawn. The deal collapsed after prosecutors said they would reserve the right to charge him in the future over potential violations of foreign lobbying rules.

David Weiss, the Delaware prosecutor leading the case against Hunter Biden, was appointed by Mr. Trump, left in office by Mr. Biden and elevated to special counsel last month by Attorney-General Merrick Garland.

The IRS agents who spoke with the congressional committee said Mr. Weiss’s office moved slowly on its investigation and was blocked from laying additional tax charges because prosecutors in Washington, D.C., declined to co-operate. Mr. Garland has said Mr. Weiss has the power to lay charges anywhere he wants.

Nothing has so far connected these criticisms to the President. The IRS’s apparent frustration with the Department of Justice, for instance, appears to have begun during the Trump administration.

Where do things go from here?

It is not yet clear how long the impeachment investigation will last and whether Mr. Biden will be impeached at the end of it. The Republicans hold a five-seat majority in the House, and many of their legislators have expressed skepticism that there is evidence Mr. Biden engaged in corruption. If he is impeached, he will almost certainly be acquitted by the Democrat-controlled Senate.

Equally uncertain is the effect the proceedings will have on the President’s re-election campaign.

Mr. Trump will try to use them to deflect from his own travails. The only president to be impeached twice, he is currently charged with 91 criminal offences for trying to overturn the 2020 election, absconding with classified documents and falsifying business records.

The elder Mr. Biden, for his part, will be hoping to rally his own supporters – and maybe picking up a few moderate Republicans – by framing the entire exercise as a waste of time.