“This would not be the first time that political operatives have attempted to cover up a potential October Surprise right before a presidential election,” America First Legal said.
The Department of Justice (DOJ) has informed America First Legal that the legal representatives of President Obama and President Biden have requested an extension under the Presidential Records Act to delay the public release of records from Joe Biden's time as vice president, including those related to Hunter Biden and his foreign business dealings.
America First Legal filed a lawsuit against the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in 2022 after the agency refused to comply with multiple FOIA requests seeking records related to the Biden family's alleged illicit foreign business dealings. NARA was expected to release the public records last week but was blocked by Biden's Justice Department following the invocation of the Presidential Records Act, which pushed the release of the documents to Nov. 6, 2024, the day after the presidential election.
"President Biden's lawyers and President Obama's legal representatives have had since June to review these records, so it is not credible that they need an additional 30 working days to review them for executive privilege," AFL said in a press release. "This would not be the first time that political operatives have attempted to cover up a potential October Surprise right before a presidential election."
The records sought by AFL pertain to email and photographs from the Biden vice presidential records archives. Specifically, email exchanges with James Biden, Lion Hall, and Hunter Biden's firm, Rosemont Seneca, and photographs of James Biden's 2015 White House visit to prepare final tax forms and financial disclosures.
AFL noted the House Oversight Committee’s "Influence Peddling Timeline" of the Biden family, which said that then-VP Biden welcomed Romanian President Klaus Iohannis to the White House, and within five weeks of the meeting, Popoviciu "began depositing [into] a Biden associate’s bank account.". Special Counsel Weiss said in court filings in August that Hunter "received compensation from a foreign principal who was attempting to influence US policy and public opinion and cause the United States to investigate the Romanian investigation."
AFL questioned in its press release: "Would the photographs of Jim Biden during a White House visit be relevant to the Romanian President's visit to then-Vice President Biden at the White House in 2015?"
Also in 2015, James Biden and his firm, Lion Hall, were compensated hundreds of thousands of dollars in "loans" from Hynansky, a significant donor to the Biden campaign. Hynansky had previously received federal loans to expand his business into Ukraine.
"How might the records relating to the preparation of Biden's 2015 tax forms and financial disclosures relate to alleged 'loan repayments' from his brother?" AFL questioned.
Dan Epstein, America First Legal Vice President, said in a statement: "NARA has arbitrarily deferred to former President Obama and current President Biden's requests to delay disclosure of likely embarrassing records util after the election that shows then-Vice President Biden's communications with Rosemont Seneca and financial disclosures that may reveal profits from Burisma through Rosemont."
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