Hunter Biden Plea Talks Break Down as DOJ Names Special Counsel

WASHINGTON—Attorney General Merrick Garland on Friday named Delaware U.S. Attorney David Weiss as a special counsel to continue his prosecution of Hunter Biden after plea talks broke down, opening a new, politically fraught chapter in the long-running legal drama as his father, President Biden, campaigns for re-election.

The appointment, which allows Weiss to prosecute Hunter Biden in any district he deems appropriate rather than solely in Delaware, came the same day Weiss said in a court filing that plea talks with Biden were at an impasse and prosecutors expected the case against him to go to trial.

Weiss asked a federal judge in Delaware to dismiss a previously filed tax case against Hunter Biden, saying prosecutors needed to try the case elsewhere, including in California, where Biden lived during the years at issue in the case.

Garland said Weiss had told him on Tuesday that his investigation had “reached a stage at which he should continue his work as a special counsel, and he asked to be so appointed.” Garland, who had previously insisted Weiss had all the necessary resources and autonomy, said the move “reaffirms that Mr. Weiss has the authority he needs to conduct a thorough investigation and continue to take the steps he deems appropriate independently, based only on the facts and the law.”

A lawyer for Hunter Biden, Chris Clark, said Biden’s legal team still believed they could resolve the case without a trial. “We are confident when all of these maneuverings are at an end, my client will have resolution and will be moving on with his life successfully,” he said.

Weiss’s appointment puts the Justice Department in the middle of an unprecedented scenario in which three different special counsels are investigating the president, his son, and the president’s likely chief rival for the 2024 campaign, GOP front-runner Donald Trump.

Special counsel Jack Smith has charged Trump with improperly withholding classified documents and separately to conspiring to illegally overturn his 2020 election loss; Trump has pleaded not guilty in both cases. Another special counsel, Robert Hur, has been examining President Biden’s handling of classified materials, after such documents dating to before his time at the White House were found at his home and office.

Weiss had already been operating largely independently, telling lawmakers last month that he had “never been denied the authority to bring charges in any jurisdiction.”

The new status means Weiss isn’t subject to day-to-day supervision by Justice Department leadership, though he must inform senior officials of significant decisions he seeks to make. He also will have to write and submit a report of his work that the attorney general can then make public. If the attorney general rejects any of his actions, Garland would have to explain that to Congress, under special-counsel regulations.

Congressional Republicans have been investigating business dealings involving Hunter Biden and the Biden family and decried the now jeopardized plea arrangement as overly lenient compared with the Justice Department’s tough line on Trump. The criticism has been fueled in part by two investigators on the case alleging improper political interference.

“Let’s be clear what today’s move is really about,” said House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R., Ky.), who has been leading the congressional probe. “The Biden Justice Department is trying to stonewall congressional oversight.”

Rep. Jim Jordan (R., Ohio), chair of the House Judiciary Committee, expressed skepticism about Garland’s action despite having once called for a special counsel in the case. “First, David Weiss said he didn’t have the power he needed and wanted special counsel status. Then, he said he had all the power he needs,” Jordan tweeted Friday. “Now, he gets special counsel status because he didn’t really have the power he needs? Something’s not right.”

Sen. Dick Durbin (D., Ill.), chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said the attorney general’s move showed he wanted to avoid “even the appearance of politicization at the Justice Department,” adding that stance stood “in stark contrast to former President Trump’s repeated efforts to use the Justice Department and Attorney General as his personal lawyer.”

Neither the White House nor Hunter Biden’s lawyers were informed of the plan ahead of the announcement, a person familiar with the matter said. The White House didn’t comment, referring questions to the Justice Department and Hunter Biden’s legal team.

The appointment was the latest twist in a meandering and politically explosive investigation into Hunter Biden’s finances, business dealings and well-documented drug and alcohol addiction.

The investigation has stretched on since 2018 under Weiss, who was appointed to the U.S. attorney post by Trump and has remained in office under the Biden administration to see through the criminal inquiry. Garland has said he gave Weiss free rein to pursue the probe as he saw fit.

Hunter Biden pleaded not guilty last month to federal tax charges, a surprise reversal that came after U.S. District Judge Maryellen Noreika refused to sign off on the earlier deal he had reached to plead guilty to tax charges and enter a separate agreement to resolve a gun charge. The judge said she needed more information and time to review the deal, citing what she described as the atypical provisions in it. On Friday, prosecutors said talks to salvage the gun agreement had also broken down. The judge asked Hunter Biden’s team to respond to the government’s filing by Monday.

In the plea hearing, prosecutors also disclosed that they were still investigating Biden and said he could face additional charges, including over potential violations of law that requires lobbyists for foreign governments or companies to register that work.

Two criminal agents from the Internal Revenue Service who worked on the investigation have alleged that political considerations appeared to infect investigative decisions at various stages in the probe, and that Biden appeared to receive preferential treatment not afforded other investigative targets.

The agents told lawmakers that prosecutors and Weiss had earlier recommended felony tax charges against Biden, even though Biden was ultimately offered a deal that involved only pleading guilty to two misdemeanor counts of willful failure to pay federal income tax, and Weiss’s office had agreed to recommend a sentence of probation alone. A felony tax crime would likely entail some prison time, though any sentence is ultimately up to the judge overseeing the case.

In an op-ed last month, one of the IRS agents, Joseph Ziegler, urged Garland to appoint a special counsel to independently review the matter. “What I saw during the investigation was entirely outside the norm,” Ziegler said.

Weiss told the House Judiciary Committee in a June letter: “I have indeed been granted ultimate authority over this matter, including responsibility for deciding when, where and whether to file charges and for making necessary decisions to preserve the integrity of the prosecution.”

In a subsequent letter, Weiss said he had never sought appointment as special counsel, and a person familiar with the matter confirmed that Tuesday was the first time he asked for that status.

Under the agreement Biden had reached with prosecutors, he admitted to making more than $1.5 million in annual income in both 2017 and 2018, much of which came from foreign sources. Biden also acknowledged that he worked with an accountant to prepare his tax returns but never actually filed them at the time or paid what he owed, in a period in which he was addicted to crack cocaine.

In 2021, a Biden associate paid $1.9 million to the IRS to cover those taxes, interest and penalties.

—Annie Linskey contributed to this article.

Write to Sadie Gurman at [email protected] and Aruna Viswanatha at [email protected]