Hunter Biden asks U.S. prosecutor to investigate former business associate

Hunter Biden has asked the top federal prosecutor in Washington, D.C., to investigate a former business associate, alleging he lied to the FBI about their business relationship, according to a copy of a letter obtained by NBC News.

The business associate, Tony Bobulinski, has said in several media interviews that 10% of a business deal involving a Chinese company and its executive Ye Jianming, was to be reserved by the partnership for the “big guy,” whom he identified as Joe Biden.

“Specifically, we recently received information demonstrating that numerous statements made by Mr. Bobulinski in Washington, D.C. during an interview with the FBI on October 23, 2020, concerning our client, Hunter Biden, are false,” Hunter Biden’s lawyer, Abbe Lowell, wrote in the letter, dated Oct. 7.

A summary of that interview was made public by the House Oversight Committee after two IRS agents, Gary Shapley and Joseph Ziegler, testified about it before Congress.

“The materials reveal the extraordinary lengths Mr. Bobulinski and other individuals were willing to go to implicate Mr. Biden or members of his family in some false and meritless allegations of wrongdoing,” Lowell wrote. “Even in an era in which people peddle knowing lies with the goal of their falsehoods being repeated and disseminated for their political advantage, these statements by Mr. Bobulinski cannot and must not go unchecked.”

Lowell said Bobulinski was introduced to Hunter Biden in 2017 by a mutual business associate for the purposes of a joint venture with a Chinese firm. Ultimately, Lowell said, the deal was never capitalized and they never engaged in “formal business operations.”

Lowell also alleges that contrary to his claim, Bobulinski was never in Miami for a meeting in 2017 with Hunter Biden, Ye and other business associates, where an initial joint venture was discussed and agreed to in principle.  

Lowell also said in the letter that it was Bobulinski and another business partner who raised the idea of a cut of a potential joint venture for “the big guy,” not a discussion Hunter Biden had with Bobulinski. 

Lowell noted that that business partner, James Gilliar, told The Wall Street Journal in October 2020 that he wished “to clear up any speculation that former Vice President Biden was involved with the 2017 discussions about our potential business structure. I am unaware of any involvement at anytime of the former Vice President. The activity in question never delivered any project revenue.”

Lowell’s letter asks U.S. Attorney Matthew Graves to investigate Bobulinski for lying to a federal agent.

Representatives for Bobulinski did not immediately respond to NBC News’ requests for comment on the allegations in the letter. The U.S. attorney’s office declined comment.

Hunter Biden, meanwhile, pleaded not guilty in September to felony gun charges in Delaware. The U.S. attorney who indicted the president’s son indicated in court filings that he planned to bring tax charges against him in a different jurisdiction.