Joe Biden named in 2017 email to Hunter seeking China natural gas deal
Joe Biden’s name was mentioned prominently in an October 2017 email seeking to firm up a controversial, multimillion-dollar deal to ship natural gas from the US to China, the communication, found on first son Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop, reveals.
In a missive dated Oct. 27 of that year, Louisiana attorney Robert W. Fenet told Hunter and his uncle, first brother Jim Biden, that he had secured a contact for them at Houston energy company Cherniere, the Daily Mail reported Friday.
“I confirm I have requested [the contact] to be available for a call from Joe Biden and Hunter Biden on Monday morning,” Fenet wrote.
The attorney did not immediately return a message from The Post requesting clarification on why the then-former vice president was name dropped.
President Biden has a history of ties to Cherniere’s executives: He named former company lobbyist and vice president Ankit Desai as his political director in 2005, and former board member Heather Zichal became his campaign climate adviser in 2020.
At the time the email was sent, however, Biden was the former Obama administration vice president and about a year-and-a-half away from announcing a presidential run. The White House did not respond to The Post’s request for a comment on the note.
Although Biden has repeatedly denied involvement in his ne’er-do-well son’s Chinese business dealings, records from Hunter’s laptop and witness testimony suggest he was aware of, if not directly connected to, the transactions.
In emails with Fenet, Jim Biden referred to the Biden clan’s involvement in the project, which involved supplying millions of tons of liquid natural gas (LNG) from Louisiana to Chinese state-backed conglomerate CEFC Energy.
“We Biden’s [sic] often fraught with problems, that they can can [sic] come from working with family members, are of a different mind. It’s all about family, and people we choose to do business with,” Jim wrote Fenet on Oct. 19, 2017.
On May 13, 2017, Hunter’s business partner James Gilliar said in an email that 10% of equity in the CEFC venture would be kept in equity “by H for the big guy.”
Both Gilliar and another Biden business partner, Tony Bobulinski, have said “the big guy” is a reference to Joe Biden.
A week later, Gilliar also warned Bobulinski to avoid referencing Joe Biden’s involvement in the deal in correspondence.
“Don’t mention Joe being involved, it’s only when u are face to face, I know u know that but they are paranoid,” he texted Bobulinksi after Hunter referred to his father in a group text as “my Chairman.”
Bobulinski later alleged that he met with Joe Biden to discuss the China deal on May 2, 2017, in the lobby bar of the Beverly Hilton with Hunter and Jim.
CEFC Chairman Yi Jianming and his No. 2, Patrick Ho, ultimately funneled over $10 million into the Biden deal before they were arrested in 2018 for bribery and corruption.
A voicemail on Hunter Biden’s scandalous laptop revealed that his father called him in the wake of a December 2018 New York Times story on his connection to the shady businessmen.
“I thought the article released online — it’s going to be printed tomorrow in the Times — was good. I think you’re clear. And anyway if you get a chance, give me a call, I love you,” Biden told his younger son on Dec. 12, 2018.
The revelation is the latest blow to scandal-ridden Hunter, who is now under scrutiny after it was revealed that he had access to his father’s Corvette in the same garage where classified documents were improperly stored.
