White House counsel Stuart Delery departs amid Biden probes

August 17, 2023

WASHINGTON — President Biden’s top White House lawyer is stepping down in the midst of federal criminal investigations into the commander-in-chief and his family, as well as a House Republican influence-peddling probe that could morph into an impeachment inquiry as soon as next month.

White House counsel Stuart Delery “has been a trusted adviser and a constant source of innovative legal thinking since Day One of my Administration,” Biden said in a Thursday statement announcing Delery’s resignation after about 13 months in the position.

Delery rarely appeared in public but was frequently invoked by White House officials when they were questioned about investigations that now are nearing critical junctions.

Special counsel Robert Hur is seeking an interview with Biden about his alleged mishandling of classified records, and newly elevated special counsel David Weiss last week was granted new powers to continue an investigation of first son Hunter Biden for alleged tax fraud and illegal lobbying after IRS whistleblowers alleged a cover-up in the case that shielded Joe Biden from questions about his purported role in lucrative dealings abroad.

Stuart Delery. — White House counsel Stuart Delery is resigning in the midst of federal criminal investigations into the Biden family.

Biden’s legal exposure is increased by an aggressive House Oversight Committee-led investigation — with Republicans led by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) demanding to see the president’s bank records and saying an impeachment inquiry is likely.

Biden, 80, has admitted to storing classified records dating to his vice presidency next to his classic Corvette in his Wilmington, Del., garage, which lacked Secret Service protection for a period before he ran for president.

He defended his conduct in January, saying: “My Corvette is in a locked garage, OK? So it’s not like they’re sitting out on the street.”

Other classified records, some dating to Biden’s Senate career, were found inside his Wilmington home and post-vice presidency office in Washington.

The House-led investigations of Joe Biden’s role in his family’s foreign dealings during his vice presidency have more closely linked him to shadowy associates of his son — though Biden has continued to insist that he never discussed business with the now-53-year-old Hunter.

As vice president, Joe Biden was put on speakerphone about 20 times during business meetings, Hunter’s former partner Devon Archer told the House Oversight Committee on July 31.

Archer revealed that then-Vice President Biden attended two separate dinners at Washington’s Café Milano — one in 2014 and another in 2015 — with his son’s Russian, Kazakh and Ukrainian patrons, rather than one as previously reported.

Hunter Biden wrote in emails retrieved from his former laptop that he had to give “half” of his income to Joe Biden, and the House Oversight Committee in May identified nine Biden family members who allegedly received foreign revenue.

Congressional Republicans expressed dismay last week at Weiss, the US attorney for Delaware, being elevated to special counsel — noting that he signed off on a “sweetheart” probation-only plea deal for Hunter that fell apart last month under scrutiny by a federal judge, revealing a secret side agreement that appeared to grant the first son broad immunity for past crimes, contrary to prosecutors’ public claims.

IRS whistleblowers Gary Shapley and Joseph Ziegler, who investigated Hunter for three years and five years, respectively, testified to Congress that officials in Weiss’ office blocked them from investigating Joe Biden’s role in business dealings — despite communications directly implicating him, including a threatening July 30, 2017, WhatsApp message in which Hunter wrote that he was “sitting here with my father” and threatened retribution if a deal was aborted, immediately preceding the transfer of $5.1 million from Chinese government-linked CEFC China Energy to Biden-linked accounts.

The IRS investigators said Weiss’ office never made them aware of an FBI informant’s tipoff, which had been referred to his office, that said Joe Biden was involved in a $10 million bribery scheme involving Ukrainian natural gas company Burisma, which also paid Hunter Biden up to $1 million per year to serve on its board as his father led the Obama administration’s Ukraine policy.

Before this year, no current or former US president had faced criminal charges — with the exception of Ulysses S. Grant, who was briefly arrested in 1872 for riding his horse at an unsafe speed.

Former President Donald Trump, who is seeking a rematch against Biden in next year’s election, was criminally charged by special counsel Jack Smith in June for allegedly mishandling classified documents after he left office.