Chris Lange, FISM News
President Biden’s younger brother, James Biden, allegedly admitted that he was hired to broker a secret $140 million deal between Saudi Arabia and a U.S. construction firm in 2012 “because of his position and relationship” to then-Vice President Joe Biden, according to legal documents first obtained by Daily Mail on Tuesday.
According to a sworn affidavit by former U.S. Treasury official Thomas Sullivan, James Biden admitted to him in a July 2017 sit-down interview that he was selected to attend meetings with the Saudi government in Riyadh on behalf of Philadelphia-based Hill International because “the name didn’t hurt.” The news outlet noted that James Biden had no prior construction experience and that, during the period of the alleged negotiations, Vice President Biden led U.S. delegations to Saudi Arabia.
The affidavit was one among several legal documents filed in connection to a drawn-out spat between Hill and the Saudi government over payments for the construction of a desalination plant in the Middle Eastern country in the 1980s.
Sullivan came into the picture in 2017, when the Virginia-based law firm of Lankford & Reed hired him to interview James Biden about his alleged involvement in the negotiations. Lankford & Reed was one of three firms hired by Hill to collect the millions it was owed by the Saudi government for the construction project.
The law firm claimed in the documents that Hill International had also hired James Biden in 2011 to help the construction firm get out of paying Lankford a 40% cut that was part of a contract between the law firm and Hill as part of a back-door settlement.
A portion of the Sullivan affidavit reads: “I asked specifically if [James Biden] had attended a meeting with the Saudi Ministry of Trade in mid-February 2012 to receive the final payment for the work Hill had performed. He answered that, to the best of his memory, he had been at such a meeting, and that the reason he had attended was ‘because of his position and relationship’ with his brother.”
In a May 2022 affidavit, Lankford & Reed partner V. Thomas Lankford described the underhanded maneuver.
“After many delays, a meeting was finally scheduled for mid-February, 2012, in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia,” he wrote. “The Professional Firms were excluded from this meeting. Hill, acting through [its CEO, Irvin] Richter, sent Jim Biden — the then sitting Vice President’s brother.”
Lankford continued: “Richter confided that he selected Biden because KSA [the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia] would not dare stiff the brother of the Vice-President who would be instrumental to the deal.”
Sullivan also testified in his affidavit that James’s wife Sara, who was present for the interview, said that Joe Biden and his younger brother “told each other everything” and that the elder Biden “doesn’t like us talking to people.”
BIDEN FAMILY SPOX: AFFIDAVITS ARE ‘SMEAR’ TACTIC
A representative for James Biden told the New York Post that the information in the affidavits was fabricated in an attempt to “smear” the first brother’s reputation.
“Mr. Biden never negotiated with the Saudi Government on behalf of Hill or any other entity. This entire story is yet another attempt to smear Jim Biden,” the representative wrote in a statement.
COMER RENEWS CALL FOR RELEASE OF FLAGGED BIDEN FAMILY BANK RECORDS
House Oversight and Accountability Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) responded to the Daily Mail report with a renewed call for the U.S. Treasury Department to provide the Committee with Biden family business bank records the agency previously flagged as “suspicious.”
“Evidence continues to mount that the Biden family used Joe Biden’s name to secure deals around the world to enrich themselves,” Comer told the Daily Mail.
“The Treasury Department must provide the suspicious activity reports generated for the Biden family and their associates to inform our investigation about the Biden family’s business schemes and Joe Biden’s involvement,” he continued, adding: “If Joe Biden is compromised by his family’s deals, this is a national security threat.”
Comer told Fox’s Sean Hannity that Committee Republicans will subpoena members of the Biden family and associates if they don’t get the records they have sought in their probe of the Biden family business.