President Biden on Monday formally declined an invitation to testify within the Republican impeachment inquiry investigating him for alleged corruption.
“Your Committee’s purported ‘impeachment inquiry’ has succeeded solely in turning up plentiful proof that, actually, the President has completed nothing unsuitable,” White Home counsel Richard Sauber wrote in a letter to Home Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.).
“It’s previous time for the Home to deal with the problems that matter to the American individuals reasonably than persevering with to waste time and taxpayer assets on this partisan charade,” Sauber added.
“Accordingly, we decline your invitation for President Biden to testify.”
Comer, who leads one of many three Home committees dealing with the impeachment probe, had prolonged an invite for the 81-year-old president to supply testimony to investigators final month – proposing an April 16 listening to date.
In his seven-page letter to the president, the Kentucky Republican wrote that proof reveals that he has “been repeatedly untruthful” by claiming he had no interactions together with his son Hunter and brother James’ abroad enterprise associates throughout and instantly after his vice presidency.
“I invite you to take part in a public listening to at which you may be afforded the chance to clarify, below oath, your involvement with your loved ones’s sources of earnings and the means it has used to generate it,” Comer wrote, indicating that the impeachment inquiry has to date “accounted for over $24 million that has flowed from overseas sources to you, your loved ones, and their enterprise associates.”
Biden has repeatedly denied any position in his kinfolk’ dealings regardless of proof that he did meet with associates from at the very least two Chinese language government-backed ventures and their contacts from Kazakhstan, Mexico, Russia and Ukraine.
Republican lawmakers concerned within the investigation allege that Hunter, 54, and James, 75, offered entry to the now-president in international locations the place he held sway over US coverage as Barack Obama’s No. 2.
“The apple doesn’t fall removed from the tree within the Biden household,” Comer said in a statement after Biden’s lawyer knowledgeable him of the choice to not testify. “Like his son, Hunter Biden, President Biden is refusing to testify in public in regards to the Bidens’ corrupt affect peddling.”
“This comes as no shock since President Biden continues to lie about his relationships together with his son’s enterprise companions, even denying they exist when his son stated below oath throughout a deposition that they did,” the Oversight Committee chairman added. “It’s unlucky President Biden is unwilling to reply questions earlier than the American individuals and refuses to reply the quite simple, easy questions we included within the invitation.”
Comer was referring to 10 questions included in his invitation letter to Biden, requesting written solutions to queries about alleged contacts between him and quite a few his son and brother’s enterprise associates, in addition to his information of the supply of cash utilized by James Biden to purportedly pay back a loan.
“Why is it so troublesome for the White Home to reply these questions? The American individuals deserve transparency from President Biden, no more lies,” Comer argued.
The invitation to the president was seen by many as an extended shot to start with, as no sitting president since Gerald Ford in 1974 has publicly testified earlier than Congress.