US President Joe Biden's son Hunter has reached a plea deal on minor tax and gun charges, concluding a five-year probe that involved persistent Republican allegations that major crimes were being covered up.
Hunter Biden, 53, has agreed to plead guilty to two counts of failure to pay federal income tax and admitted to illegally possessing a gun despite being a drug user, prosecutors said Tuesday.
The plea agreement between Hunter Biden and the US Attorney's Office in his home state of Delaware will need to be approved by a federal judge. The president's son is unlikely to face any prison time. According to The Washington Post, prosecutors will seek probation on the tax and gun charges.
When asked on Tuesday about the plea deal, President Biden, 80, told reporters at an event in California that he was "very proud of my son."
US Attorney David Weiss, an appointee of former president Donald Trump, said Hunter Biden had agreed to plead guilty to "two counts of willful failure to pay federal income tax."
According to the charges, Hunter Biden, a Yale-trained lawyer and lobbyist, failed to file his tax returns on time on earnings of more than $1.5 million for 2017 and 2018.
In both years he owed more than $100,000 in taxes on those earnings.
Each count brings up to 12 months in prison and a fine of up to $100,000 or double what he stood to gain by breaking the law.
Weiss said Hunter Biden was also facing one count of "possession of a firearm by a person who is an unlawful user of or addicted to a controlled substance."
- Addiction -
Hunter Biden detailed his struggles with crack cocaine and other drugs in a 2021 memoir, released months after his father took office.
He will not be prosecuted on the gun charge but will enter what is known as "pretrial diversion," which often involves counseling or rehabilitation.
In a statement, Christopher Clark, Hunter Biden's lawyer, said "it is my understanding that the five-year investigation into Hunter is resolved.
"Hunter will take responsibility for two instances of misdemeanor failure to file tax payments when due," Clark said.
"I know Hunter believes it is important to take responsibility for these mistakes he made during a period of turmoil and addiction in his life," he added. "He looks forward to continuing his recovery and moving forward."
Trump, who is facing felony charges in Florida of mishandling government secrets and charges in New York for paying hush money to a porn star, sought to contrast his own legal woes with those of the president's son.
Trump slammed the plea agreement as a mere "traffic ticket" for Hunter Biden and a "full scale election interference 'scam.'"
"Our system is BROKEN!" Trump said in a post on his Truth Social platform.
Trump is currently the frontrunner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, and may well face Biden next year in a rematch of the 2020 White House race.
- 'Slap on the wrist'? -
Representative James Comer, the Republican chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, described the plea agreement as a "slap on the wrist" and pledged to continue his investigation into the Biden family's business dealings.
"These charges against Hunter Biden and sweetheart plea deal have no impact on the Oversight Committee's investigation," Comer said.
Hunter Biden became a regular focus of Trump's attacks ahead of the November 2020 election for his work in Ukraine and China.
In his memoir, "Beautiful Things," Hunter Biden insisted he has never done anything unethical and dismissed allegations that he displayed a lack of judgment by accepting a lucrative position on the board of Ukrainian energy company Burisma while his father was Barack Obama's vice president.
Trump was impeached by the House of Representatives in December 2019 for seeking political dirt on the Bidens ahead of the 2020 election from Ukrainian President VolodymyrZelensky. He was acquitted by the Senate.
Hunter Biden, who was discharged from the Navy Reserve in 2014 after a positive test for cocaine, describes how he started drinking heavily in his 20s, went to rehab and relapsed after his elder brother Beau died of brain cancer in 2015 at age 46.
"I've bought crack cocaine on the streets of Washington DC, and cooked up my own inside a hotel bungalow in Los Angeles," Biden said in his memoir.
Hunter and Beau survived a car crash that killed their mother and sister in December 1972, just weeks after their father was first elected a US senator from Delaware.