David C. Weiss, the special prosecutor who spent years investigating Hunter Biden, criticized President Biden for making “baseless allegations” about his investigation that threatened “the integrity of the justice system as a whole” in a final report released Monday.
“The president’s characterizations are inaccurate on the facts of this case, and on a more fundamental level, they are wrong,” Mr. Weiss wrote.
His inquiry was hotly debated until the president issued a broad pardon ending the case against his son, saying the prosecution was the result of “crude politics.”
The report, some 27 pages long, seemed like a sharp rejoinder to the president. Citing court rulings that found the case was fairly litigated, Mr. Weiss used his closing arguments on the lengthy investigation to condemn the characterization of President Biden.
“Politicians who attack the decisions of career prosecutors as politically motivated when they disagree with the outcome of the case are undermining public confidence in our criminal justice system,” the report states. Weiss. “The president’s statements unfairly call into question the integrity not only of Justice Department staff, but of all public servants who make these difficult decisions in good faith.”
Despite its relative brevity, Mr. Weiss contains many more pages of appendices, including Hunter Biden’s indictments and other significant court filings.
The announcement comes amid a much more contentious 11th-hour legal battle over the release of a report by Jack Smith, the special prosecutor who brought two indictments against Donald J. Trump only for both to fail in part because of Mr. Trump’s election victory. Trump in 2024.
Mr. Time Weiss as a special prosecutor began after he had been investigating Hunter Biden for several years on tax, financial and foreign lobbying issues. The two sides briefly entered into a plea deal, but the unusual nature of the deal—along with the government’s unwillingness to promise that the investigation would end in a settlement—resulted in its collapse in July 2023.
Unsuccessful declaration led Mr. Weiss to seek and receive the appointment of a special prosecutor, allowing him to bring charges against the president’s son in two jurisdictions — related to lying on a gun purchase form in Delaware and tax charges in Los Angeles.
Last year, a jury in Wilmington, Del., convicted the younger Mr. Biden on gun charges. He pleaded guilty in the tax case, but his father pardoned him while awaiting sentencing in both cases. The president not only exonerated his son, but also granted him a blanket pardon for all potential crimes covering a period of more than 10 years.
In doing so, the president said his son’s case was tainted by politics, a claim that angered Mr. Weiss and the Justice Department, especially since the president has maintained for years that the case was handled independently.
Because the presidential pardon effectively precluded any such analysis, the report said, Mr. Weiss did not reach conclusions about the possibility that Hunter Biden had committed other crimes.
Mr. Weiss was also charged and received a guilty plea from another man, Alexander Smirnov, for lying to the FBI during the 2020 election period by falsely claiming to have knowledge of corrupt payments to the father and son. Mr. Smirnov, a longtime FBI informant, alleged that executives from the Ukrainian energy company Burisma paid Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Hunter Biden $5 million each around 2015 – an allegation that has been publicized by Republicans in Congress .
