U.S. President Joe Biden received unwelcome news when the Justice Department made the prosecutor investigating his son a special counsel, a move that ensured Hunter Biden’s legal issues will remain front and center in the 2024 election.
Biden’s allies were hopeful a plea agreement between Hunter Biden and Delaware U.S. Attorney David Weiss would allow the president to move past his son’s legal troubles as much as possible, even as congressional Republicans pursued their investigations. But Weiss’s new role as special counsel, announced Friday, is sure to extend the saga into the heart of the presidential campaign.
Weiss will have broad powers to investigate the tax and gun crimes that were at the center of the plea deal that collapsed in court last month, as well as whether Hunter Biden violated foreign lobbying or other laws in his involvements with companies in Ukraine and China.