No one has looked into a potential conflict of interest between former Vice President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter, getting an “exorbitant salary” and seat on the board of Ukraine-based company Burisma, despite what Democrats have said, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said Thursday.
“I don’t know how many times it was said by the (House impeachment) managers that the Biden conflict of interest allegations has been debunked and has been, there’s no scintilla of evidence in terms of conflicts of interest and potential wrongdoing. I know a lot about the Trump family and their dealings in Russia. I don’t know anything about the Biden connection to the Ukraine, so when the managers tell me this has been looked at and debunked. By who?” he told reporters on Capitol Hill.
“Nobody has looked at what has happened in the Ukraine,” Graham said. “It’s a notoriously corrupt place. Within a month of being given the Ukrainian portfolio, the vice president’s son is hired by Burisma – one of the most corrupt companies in the Ukraine at a fairly exorbitant salary.”
“They also – Burisma – hires John Kerry’s stepson and on and on and on. The point is that the prosecutor, who I think was corrupt, opened up a case in May of 2014 against Burisma, raided the president’s home – Burisma’s president’s home – in February of 2016, and six weeks later, seven weeks later was fired,” the senator said.
“In 2015, the president of Burisma, Zlochevsky, was named by our ambassador as somebody Ukrainian prosecutors should look at for corruption. The person who followed the fired prosecutor dropped the case against Burisma. I don’t know, doesn’t pass the smell test to me. Why are you paying Hunter Biden?” Graham asked.
“You can say they’re corrupt, but they’re not stupid. Does it make sense to hire the son of the guy in charge of the portfolio for the American government? And from the time they raided the president’s home, Joe Biden called the president of the Ukraine four times, got on a plane, and said if you don’t fire this guy, you don’t get the billion dollars,” he said.
Graham said if Trump had done the same thing Biden did, there would be lots of questions.
“I love Joe Biden, but I can tell you if the name was Trump, there’d be a lot of questions asked. So what do I want out of all of this? I want the public to understand that the claims they’re making that there’s no there, there in Biden’s, nobody’s looked. Somebody should, and I’ve looked, and I’ve got a lot of questions,” he said.
The Scoopess 