On 17 Jan 2024, Edward Blum <elonx@protonmail.com> posted some
news:uo9ess$26mm1$1@dont-email.me:

> If Hunter was black and a Republican, he'd be locked up for 20 years
> already.

WASHINGTON (AP) � Federal prosecutors urged a judge on Tuesday to reject
Hunter Biden�s efforts to dismiss the gun charges against him, revealing
that investigators last year found cocaine residue on the pouch the
president�s son used to hold his gun.

In pressing for the case against President Joe Biden�s son to proceed,
prosecutors said �the strength of the evidence against him is
overwhelming� and pushed back against Hunter Biden�s claims that he is
being singled out for political purposes.

In addition to �incriminating statements� Hunter Biden made about his
drug use in his 2021 memoir, investigators found a white powdery
substance on the brown leather pouch he used to store the gun after
pulling it from the state police vault last year, prosecutors wrote. An
FBI chemist determined it was cocaine, they said.

�To be clear, investigators literally found drugs on the pouch where the
defendant had kept his gun,� prosecutors said.

Hunter Biden has pleaded not guilty to charges accusing him of lying
about his drug use in October 2018 on a form to buy a gun that he kept
for about 11 days. He has acknowledged struggling with an addiction to
crack cocaine during that period in 2018, but his lawyers have said he
didn�t break the law. Hunter Biden has since said that he�s stopped
using drugs and has worked to turn his life around.

His attorneys didn�t immediately respond to requests for comment on the
prosecutors� filing Tuesday.

These criminal proceedings could have been avoided with a plea deal last
year, but an agreement with federal prosecutors fell apart and now the
president�s son is facing the spectacle of a trial this year while his
father is campaigning. He was indicted after the plea deal broke down
when a judge who was supposed to sign off on the agreement instead
raised a series of questions about the deal.

He had initially agreed to plead guilty to misdemeanor tax charges and
would have also avoided prosecution on the gun charges had he stayed out
of trouble for two years. It was the culmination of a yearslong
investigation by federal prosecutors into the business dealings of the
president�s son.

His lawyers have urged the judge to dismiss the gun case, alleging he
was �selectively charged� for improper political purposes. They have
argued that special counsel David Weiss � who also serves as U.S.
attorney for Delaware and was originally appointed by former President
Donald Trump � �buckled under political pressure� to bring more severe
charges amid criticism of the deal from Trump and other Republicans.

Prosecutors, however, said there is no evidence �to support his
allegation that the Executive Branch, led by his father, President
Biden, and its Justice Department, led by the Attorney General appointed
by his father, authorized prosecution by the U.S. Attorney and Special
Counsel of their choosing for an �improper political purpose.��

�The charges in this case are not trumped up or because of former
President Trump � they are instead a result of the defendant�s own
choices and were brought in spite of, not because of, any outside noise
made by politicians,� prosecutors wrote.

Hunter Biden�s criminal proceedings are also happening in parallel to so
far unsuccessful efforts by congressional Republicans to link his
business dealings to his father. Republicans are pursuing an impeachment
inquiry into President Biden, claiming he was engaged in an
influence-peddling scheme with his son. But House Republicans on Tuesday
halted plans to hold Hunter Biden in contempt of Congress for defying a
congressional subpoena in their ongoing investigation, citing
negotiations with his attorneys that could end the standoff.

No evidence has emerged so far to prove that the president, in his
current or previous office, abused his role or accepted bribes, though
questions have arisen about the ethics surrounding the Biden family�s
international business dealings.

https://apnews.com/article/hunter-biden-gun-charges-cocaine-87f74ce87edf6
0b933225d736c4e1c4e