New Emails: Hunter Biden Tried to Use His Father To Get Billions in Libyan Assets Unfrozen, In Exchange for "Success Fees"

If the scheme to use political connections to get the US to free up billions of dollars' worth of frozen Libyan assets, and then take a percentage cut of that, sounds familiar, it's because Hillary Clinton's Master of Whispers and Chief Conspiracy Theorist Sydney Blumenthal was trying to work the same kind of deal. Mark Hemingway reported in 2019:

The documents, provided to the FBI in June 2016 as the agency was kicking its Trump-Russia investigation into high gear, allege that Clinton confidant Sidney Blumenthal sent her "a series of detailed memos and reports about Libya," which were intended as a "quid pro quo" which might help a post-Gaddafi Libya recover as much as $66 billion in offshore funds hidden by the slain strongman.

According to the private investigators funded by Judicial Watch: "Our evidence shows that Mr. Blumenthal was involved with a group of intelligence professionals seeking to repatriate asset[s] which were plundered and then exfiltrated by the [Gaddafi] family and hidden in various offshore localities."

According to the private investigators funded by Judicial Watch: "Our evidence shows that Mr. Blumenthal was involved with a group of intelligence professionals seeking to repatriate asset[s] which were plundered and then exfiltrated by the [Gaddafi] family and hidden in various offshore localities."

If successful, Blumenthal and associates "stood to gain a brokers' cut of perhaps hundreds of millions of dollars."

The private Libya inquiry leaves important issues unsettled. The documents do not include emails or other original source material to support the allegations within. While claiming to possess evidence that Blumenthal and his associates had contracts and offshore accounts to repatriate the money, the documents say "no concrete evidence" was found suggesting Clinton acted to support the effort.

Yet if verified, the files might shed light on why Clinton kept her emails, tens of thousands of which have gone missing, out of normal government communication channels.

From Business Insider (archive.is link), Hunter Biden was enlisted to provide the same corrupt service.

Two previously unpublished emails sent by business contacts of Hunter Biden indicate that the president's son requested an annual retainer of $2 million to help recover billions in Libyan assets frozen by the Obama administration.

Let me note right away that $2 million was only a retainer -- the deal also included "+++ success fees."

That's a lot of plusses before success fees.

In other words: a large percentage of the booty.

These emails aren't part of the laptop trove, either. They come from another source.

The emails, obtained by Insider during reporting on an unrelated matter, are not connected to the controversial emails from Hunter Biden's laptop, which his supporters have claimed were distributed as part of a disinformation campaign. And while it appears from the new emails that the Libya deal was never consummated, the documents offer a window into the mechanics of Beltway influence peddling, and the stock that was put in Biden's political connections -- particularly his relationship with his father, who was vice president at the time.

The first email, dated January 28, 2015, was sent from Sam Jauhari, a Democratic donor with businesses in the Persian Gulf, who was helping spearhead the Libya project. It was addressed to Sheikh Mohammed al-Rahbani, another Obama campaign donor involved in the proposal. In the email, Jauhari is frank about what Biden would bring to the table, and what he says Biden wanted in return:

Per phone conversation I met with #2 son. He wants $2 per year retainer +++ success fees. He wants to hire his own people - it can be close circle of people for confidentiality. His dad is deciding to run or not.

His positives are he is Chairman of UN World Food Program, son of #2 who has Libya file, access to State, Treasury, business partner SofS [Secretary of State] J. [John] Forbes K [Kerry] son and since he travels with dad he is connected everywhere in Europe and Asia where M. Q. [Muammar Qaddafi] and LIA [Libya Investment Authority] had money frozen. He said he has access to highest level in PRC [China], he can help there.

His negatives are that he is alcoholic, drug addict - kicked [out] of U.S. Army for cocaine, chasing low class hookers, constantly needs money-liquidity problems and many more headaches.

We should meet in Gstraad or London to decide next steps.

At least one aspect of Jauhari's assessment of Biden is erroneous: Biden was discharged from the Navy Reserve, not the Army, and it was never confirmed that Biden's positive test for cocaine was the reason. But the tally of his "positives" reflects a keen sense of what he could offer the project. Biden's position at the United Nations meant he enjoyed face-to-face access to heads of state.

...

Biden's apparent offer to provide "access to the highest level" in the Chinese government is also telling. China, which was attempting to strengthen its position in Africa, had been a particular source of frustration for Libya's new government, which was struggling to free up $15 billion in foreign assets that had been frozen by Obama during the Qaddafi regime. In 2013, according to The New Yorker, Hunter Biden had traveled with his father on an official visit to Beijing, where he had arranged for the vice president to briefly meet one of his business partners in the lobby of the American delegation's hotel.

Such access may, in fact, have been worth the price that Biden was cited as quoting. Two people close to the negotiations told Insider that the "$2 per year retainer" mentioned in the email meant $2 million. "My recollection was that anything that had to do with Hunter started at $2 million," said one. Jauhari and his partners, according to other documents obtained by Insider, expected to pocket as much as 5% of whatever sanctioned money they could free up for Libya. That meant a possible payday in the hundreds of millions. It's unclear whether any "success fees" for Biden would have been pegged in some way to those proceeds.

A second email emphasized that this must be a small, tightly-knit conspiracy of people who knew each other, due to the "sensitivities" of corruption and favor-trading on such a scale:

I spoke with HB's team yesterday. They are interested in the project, but emphasized that for them to get involved, the team (lobbyists, lawyers and PR) would need to be a small group of folks they have a tight relationship with. They do not want a large group involved and they only want people with whom they have a close relationship with due to the sensitivities surrounding their involvement.

In related news, the New York Post offers a sarcastic "thank you" to Politico to "confirming" the authenticity of the Hunter laptop emails, even though that authenticity had been confirmed early last year.

In his new book, "The Bidens: Inside the First Family's Fifty-Year Rise to Power," Politico reporter Ben Schreckinger says that evidence points to Hunter Biden's laptop being legit.

While we appreciate the support, the truth is The Post's reports always have been true, and it’s only because the media wants to protect Joe Biden that they keep referring to the laptop as "unsubstantiated."

Schreckinger notes that "A person who had independent access to Hunter Biden's emails" confirms two of the emails The Post published, including one about a potential deal with China with the line "10 held by H for the big guy?" -- that is, Joe Biden.

But Hunter Biden's former business partner Tony Bobulinski already said those emails were authentic -- the media just ignored him.

posted by Ace at 01:38 PM

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