WASHINGTON (NewsNation) — The House Oversight Committee is inching closer to subpoenaing President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, Wednesday morning as the Bidens are past the deadline set by the committee to provide records related to their family business dealings overseas in Ukraine and China.
Overnight, the president’s son and brother, James Biden, missed the panel’s deadline to turn over records on his foreign business dealings. The committee first made the request on Feb. 9.
The chairman of the House Oversight Committee, Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), accused the Bidens of influence peddling, saying he doesn’t know what specialty services Hunter or James provided in those countries to receive millions in return.
The committee also wants to know whether the president is aware of the potential family businesses with these countries.
A spokesperson for the committee told NewsNation that Hunter and his uncle James Biden’s attorneys have sent letters acknowledging the requests, but have not provided materials themselves.
The committee is, however, in contact with the attorney for one of their business associates, Eric Schwerin, and expects him to start producing documents soon. It has also recently asked for testimony from Schwerin.
Hunter has long been in the crosshairs of the GOP. His ties to Burisma, a Ukrainian energy company, have been a fixation for many conservative-leaning outlets.
The younger Biden joined the board of Burisma in 2014, around the time his father — then-vice president — was helping conduct the Obama administration’s foreign policy with Ukraine.
Several members of the GOP have long argued, without evidence, that Hunter Biden’s work in Ukraine influenced the Obama administration’s policies toward the Eastern European nation.
This is just one of a slew of investigations by the Republican-led committee, vowing to bring “transparency and accountability about the Biden family’s influence peddling,” as they call it.
The White House called these investigations “divorced-from-reality political stunts.”
Hunter’s attorney, Abbe Lowell, has offered to sit down with the committee to determine any legislative purpose for this investigation, arguing that his client is a private citizen.
A representative said the committee has yet to take Hunter’s attorney up on his offer.
“While we have not yet heard back from the Committee, our offer to discuss ways we can be helpful toward a legitimate legislative purpose still stands,” Biden’s legal team told NewsNation Thursday morning.
Hunter’s attorney has called the committee a “wonderland” and its leader the “Queen of Hearts” for Comer’s “inaccurate and baseless conclusions.”
Subpoenas will be a last resort, according to at least one member of the committee.
Rep. Pat Fallon (R-Texas) told NewsNation correspondent Joe Khalil that the committee will only issue the subpoenas if warranted.
“Chairman Comer believes in subpoenas only if warranted. They should be treated as last-resort options,” Fallon said. “However, if treasury and involved parties refuse to cooperate all tools, including subpoenas, are on the table.”
NewsNation’s Joe Khalil and The Associated Press contributed to this report.