The Manchurian Candidate

Joe China must never be allowed near the White House again
By Steve Hilton
Beijing man Joe China

As America's economy roars ahead, we bring you the truth about the man who says he wants to take us back -- Joe Biden.
On Friday, there was more confirmation that the central promise of the Trump revolution -- to get the economy moving again -- is being delivered.

Growth is up, investment up and incomes are up. 

It is an incredible performance for this stage of an economic expansion and is the direct result of this administration's pro-enterprise policy agenda. 

This is Donald Trump's blue-collar boom, delivering historic results for working Americans, exactly as he promised.
Meanwhile, last week we also saw the launch of a presidential campaign built on a pledge to go back to the pre-Trump era -- the era of slow growth and wage stagnation. 

After months of dithering, after pathetically fishing around for a pre-picked running mate like Stacey Abrams. 

After telling us with that move that he himself believes he is too old, too white, too male and too establishment to win his party's nomination, Joe Biden has finally entered the race for 2020.
Biden says he wants to take America back to "normal." 

We're going to show you what Joe Biden's "normal" really looks like and give you the facts that not only reveal his political vulnerability but which, by the Democrats' own standards, make him unfit for the presidency and which should disqualify his candidacy.
In 2016, Americans voted against the establishment and since then, as they've seen the establishment close ranks to undermine President Trump at every turn, the rage against the Swamp Machine has, if anything, increased.
Now, the establishment wants its power back. 

They're running Joe Biden for president, and it is literally impossible to think of a more establishment politician than him. 

He is the very definition of a corrupt insider.
Biden has been a professional politician for nearly 50 years -- and what a record he's built in that time. 

We know Biden is sexist. 

His creepy habit of inappropriate touching shows that, while he may not actively discriminate against women -- in his "soul," as he might say -- he views women as less than men. 

And of course, his creepy clean-up video didn't fool anyone.
It's the same with race. 

Just remember how he talks about people from a different racial background. 

He has said things like the following:
On Obama: "I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy. I mean, that's a storybook, man."
On the ethnic makeup of his home state: "You cannot go to a 7-Eleven or a Dunkin' Donuts unless you have a slight Indian accent. I'm not joking."
Again, let's be precise about the point: I'm not saying Biden believes in racial discrimination. 

But anyone who speaks like that, in his "soul," clearly thinks black and brown people are less than white people.
We know Joe Biden is verbally incontinent and can barely open his mouth without putting his foot in it. 

But the thing that is less well-known is how irredeemably swampy Biden is. 

Just for his own use, he has taken $29 million in donations since 1989 -- that's as far back as the data goes. 

All those millions mean favors for special interests.
Here's just a few highlights from his swampy career.
Biden loves to tout his foreign policy experience. 

And yes, he has plenty of experience with foreign governments -- or should I say, their lobbyists. Foreign government lobbying, one of the most inexcusable swamp practices, was all part of the job for Joe Biden when he was chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. 

He took money from lobbyists for Dubai, for the United Arab Emirates, for Ethiopia, for Sri Lanka, for China and yes, for Turkey. 

Turkey? 

I seem to remember Democrats getting rather upset when Michael Flynn was accused of lobbying for Turkey
But the biggest payoff for Biden during his time in the Senate came from credit card company MBNA. 

His craven backing for MBNA, in exchange for their cash, even earned Biden the nickname "the Senator from MBNA."
Effectively countering China's rise is the single most important strategic challenge for the next president. 

How can Joe Biden possibly do that when the Chinese government has been funding Biden family businesses? 

Just on the basis of what we already know, by the standards the Democrats have set for Trump, Joe Biden is compromised by a foreign power and unfit to be president.
In 2005, Biden backed a bankruptcy bill that protected banks and credit card companies while hurting middle-class families. 

Biden might say, well, MBNA is headquartered in Delaware, I represent Delaware in the Senate, so of course, I'm going to help them. 

But if it's a senator's job to help businesses based in their state, why do you need to be paid millions of dollars extra to do it?
The simple truth is that Biden sided with his donors against working Americans, and that's the real story of his life. 

His entire office was infested by swampiness.
His legislative assistant, Tracy Becker, became a lobbyist for MWW group. 

His political director, Ankit Desai, became a lobbyist at the same firm, before becoming a lobbyist for Cheniere Energy. 

Biden's chief counsel became a lobbyist at Mayer Brown. 

In 2008, Biden brought him back to work as an advisory board member for the Obama-Biden transition team. 

Great!
Biden's policy adviser, Michael Haltzel, became a lobbyist for DLA Piper. 

His deputy chief of staff as vice president, Alan Hoffman, became the chief lobbyist for PepsiCo before becoming a lobbyist for Herbalife International.
On and on it goes, round and round it spins -- Joe Biden's revolving door. 

Five decades of favor-trading, influence peddling and corruption. 

So swampy.
But so what, some might say. 

They're all like that. 

Yes, they are. 

But there's one more thing about Biden. 

This is what makes him dangerous. 

This is what should disqualify him from the presidency. 

Since 2016, the Democrats and their establishment media allies have relentlessly accused President Trump of being a foreign agent or being compromised by a foreign power. 

And they're still saying it, even though the Mueller investigation concluded that it was all a lie.

Beijing man

With Joe Biden, on the other hand, there is a much more worrying relationship with a foreign power, one that presents a vastly bigger threat to America than Russia -- China.
In December 2013, then-Vice President Biden rode Air Force Two on an official trip to Asia, as tensions were high over disputed territories in the East China Sea. 

Biden was joined by his son, Hunter, who was building a private equity firm along with his business partner and friend, Chris Heinz -- heir of the Heinz Ketchup family fortune and stepson of then-Secretary of State John Kerry.
Vice President Biden and Hunter Biden were ushered into Beijing on a red carpet with a delegation of Chinese officials. 

From there, Joe went straight into meetings with the vice president of China and Xi Jinping.
The next morning, the Bidens had a meeting with the U.S.-China Business Council. 

From there, it was off to Villa No.5 of the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse, where Madame Mao lived during the cultural revolution.
Joe Biden struck a soft, friendly tone with the Chinese leadership, disappointing allies in the area, like Japan, who were alarmed by China's increasing aggression. 

But Joe had other issues besides the global balance of power on his mind, issues like his son's business deals.
Hunter's presence on the trip was far from coincidence. 

Just 10 days later, his company, Rosemont Seneca, signed an exclusive $1 billion deal with the state-owned Bank of China, creating an investment fund called Bohai Harvest, with money backed by the Chinese government.
In the words of Peter Schweizer, who first unveiled these conflicts of interest in his book "Secret Empires," "the Chinese government was literally funding a business that it co-owned along with the sons of two of America's most powerful decision makers." 
That is what it looks like to be "compromised by a foreign power."
And that deal was far from a one-off.
In 2011, less than a year after opening his company, Hunter Biden was in China working with a company called Thornton Group to explore business opportunities with Chinese state-owned enterprises.
The Thornton Group touted the meetings on their Chinese-language website, saying Chinese executives "extended their warm welcome" to the "Thornton Group, with its U.S. partner Rosemont Seneca Chairman Hunter Biden (second son of the now Vice President Joe Biden)."
A screengrab of that web post captured by the Government Accountability Institute features a number of photos of Hunter Biden posing with powerful Chinese officials.
Thornton Group was marketing their access to the son of the vice president to attract business with China.
But guess what?
The write-up and pictures of those meetings on Thornton Group's Chinese language website did not appear on their English-language website. 
And here's another curious fact: These meetings occurred just hours before Vice President Joe Biden met with the Chinese dictator in Washington.
In May that same year, Hunter had a second meeting with many of the same Chinese financial powerhouses -- just two weeks after his dad, the vice president, opened up the U.S.-China strategic dialogue with Chinese officials in Washington.
And in 2014, another arm of Hunter's company -- Rosemont Realty -- began negotiating multi-billion dollar deals with Gemini Investments, a Chinese firm with ties to the China ocean shipping company which operates as an extension of the Chinese military.
But it's not even just China.
A recent court case gave us a close look at the financial statements of Rosemont Seneca Bohai.
Most of the money going out of the account was to Hunter Biden.
Wait till you see where some of the money going into it came from:

• $145K from a Kazak oligarch
• $1 million from Chinese entities
• $1.2 million from a mysterious LLC tied to a Swiss bank that's been implicated in money laundering
• $3.1 million from corrupt Ukrainian oligarchs

Speaking of corruption in the Ukraine, recent reporting by investigative journalist John Solomon revealed that in March 2016, when Ukraine's chief prosecutor Viktor Shokin conducted a wide-ranging corruption probe into the natural gas firm Burisma holdings, of which Hunter Biden -- who else -- was a board member, his father Joe threatened to withhold $1 billion in loan guarantees from the U.S. government unless that prosecutor was fired.
When it came to a choice between working Americans and his donors, Biden chose the donors.
When it came to a choice between working Americans and China, he chose China. 
He may have started out as a blue collar boy from Scranton, Pa., but he ended up as a swampy stooge for Beijing, China
Look, Joe Biden has been through family tragedy that, to me, seems unendurable -- and he has handled it with obvious strength and grace.
But he's putting himself forward for the Oval Office, not Oprah.
He must be accountable for his actions and the swampiness we've shown you.
Joe Biden obviously loves his children and would do anything for them.
I feel the same way about mine.
But when you're the vice president, you can't run around doing favors for America's enemies to help make money for your son.
Think of all the breathless bloviating these past two years about Jared Kushner's property dealings and Ivanka Trump's business in China and Moscow Trump hotels that never got built.
Most of it, by the way, before Donald Trump became president.
And none of it, obviously, influencing policy, since this president has been much tougher on Russia than Obama ever was and is the first president to stand up to China in about 50 years.
By contrast, these Biden deals were real.
They happened.
Literally, billions of dollars paid over by the Chinese government to Biden companies when Joe Biden was vice president and when Joe Biden went soft on China.
Effectively countering China's rise is the single most important strategic challenge for the next president.
How can Biden possibly do that when the Chinese government has been funding Biden family businesses?
Just on the basis of what we already know, by the standards the Democrats have set for Trump, Joe Biden is compromised by a foreign power and unfit to be president.
But there is a lot more we need to know.
What went on in those Beijing meetings?
In Villa no.5?
What promises were made?
What favors were exchanged?
Why did Joe Biden go soft on China when its aggression -- and our allies -- demanded a tough response?
To borrow Nancy Pelosi's words, what does China have on Joe Biden politically, personally or financially?
Here's the bottom line about Joe Biden: He is a fake and a phony.
On Monday he launches his campaign in a union hall to brand himself a man of the working people. Don't let him fool you.
He's trading on a reputation that hasn't been true for decades.
When it came to a choice between working Americans and his donors, he chose the donors.
When it came to a choice between working Americans and China, he chose China. 
He may have started out as a blue-collar boy from Scranton, Pa., but he ended up as a swampy stooge for Beijing, China.
Joe Biden is "Joe China," and he must never be allowed anywhere near the White House again.

How China gained favorable policy actions from the Obama administration

Inside the shady private equity firm run by Kerry and Biden’s kids

By Peter Schweizer

John Kerry (left) and Joe Biden.

‘Secret Empires’ by Peter Schweizer

“My frustration,” writes Peter Schweizer in his new book, “Secret Empires: How the American Political Class Hides Corruption and Enriches Family and Friends,” “is not that the solid reporting on Trump has been too tough, but that the reporting on the Obama administration has been way too soft or in some cases nonexistent.” 

The author of the 2016 sensation “Clinton Cash” says Trump and his children didn’t invent the blurring of government and business, and details a number of ethical violations on both sides of the political aisle. 

One example: the little-noticed private equity firm run by the sons of Democrats Joe Biden and John Kerry, as detailed in this exclusive first excerpt.
Joe Biden and John Kerry have been pillars of the Washington establishment for more than 30 years. Biden is one of the most popular politicians in our nation’s capital.
His demeanor, sense of humor, and even his friendly gaffes have allowed him to form close relationships with both Democrats and Republicans. 

His public image is built around his “Lunch Bucket Joe” persona. 

As he reminds the American people on regular occasions, he has little wealth to show for his career, despite having reached the vice presidency.
One of his closest political allies in Washington is former senator and former Secretary of State John Kerry. 

“Lunch Bucket Joe” he ain’t; Kerry is more patrician than earthy. 

But the two men became close while serving for several decades together in the US Senate. 

The two “often talked on matters of foreign policy,” says Jules Witcover in his Biden biography.
So their sons going into business together in June 2009 was not exactly a bolt out of the blue.
But with whom their sons cut lucrative deals while the elder two were steering the ship of state is more of a surprise.
What Hunter Biden, the son of America’s vice president, and Christopher Heinz, the stepson of the chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations (later to be secretary of state) John Kerry, were creating was an international private equity firm. 

It was anchored by the Heinz family alternative investment fund, Rosemont Capital. 

The new firm would be populated by political loyalists and positioned to strike profitable deals overseas with foreign governments and officials with whom the US government was negotiating.
Hunter Biden, Vice President Joe Biden’s youngest son, had gone through a series of jobs since graduating from Yale Law School in 1996, including the hedge-fund business.
By the summer of 2009, the 39-year-old Hunter joined forces with the son of another powerful figure in American politics, Chris Heinz. 

Senator John Heinz of Pennsylvania had tragically died in a 1991 airplane crash when Chris was 18. Chris, his brothers, and his mother inherited a large chunk of the family’s vast ketchup fortune, including a network of investment funds and a Pennsylvania estate, among other properties. 

In May 1995, his mother, Teresa, married Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts. 

That same year, Chris graduated from Yale, and then went on to get his MBA from Harvard Business School.

Hunter Biden (left) with father Joe Biden following the inauguration ceremony of President Barack Obama, Jan. 20, 2009.

Joining them in the Rosemont venture was Devon Archer, a longtime Heinz and Kerry friend.
The three friends established a series of related LLCs. 

The trunk of the tree was Rosemont Capital, the alternative investment fund of the Heinz Family Office. 

Rosemont Farm is the name of the Heinz family’s 90-acre estate outside Fox Chapel, Pennsylvania.
The small fund grew quickly. 

According to an email revealed as part of a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation, Rosemont described themselves as “a $2.4 billion private equity firm co-owned by Hunter Biden and Chris Heinz,” with Devon Archer as “Managing Partner.”
The partners attached several branches to the Rosemont Capital trunk, including Rosemont Seneca Partners, LLC, Rosemont Seneca Technology Partners, and Rosemont Realty.
Of the various deals in which these Rosemont entities were involved, one of the largest and most troubling concerns was Rosemont Seneca Partners.
Rather than set up shop in New York City, the financial capital of the world, Rosemont Seneca leased space in Washington, DC. 

They occupied an all-brick building on Wisconsin Avenue, the main thoroughfare of exclusive Georgetown. 

Their offices would be less than a mile from John and Teresa Kerry’s 23-room Georgetown mansion, and just two miles from both Joe Biden’s office in the White House and his residence at the Naval Observatory.
Over the next seven years, as both Joe Biden and John Kerry negotiated sensitive and high-stakes deals with foreign governments, Rosemont entities secured a series of exclusive deals often with those same foreign governments.
Some of the deals they secured may remain hidden. 

These Rosemont entities are, after all, within a private equity firm and as such are not required to report or disclose their financial dealings publicly.
Some of their transactions are nevertheless traceable by investigating world capital markets. 

A troubling pattern emerges from this research, showing how profitable deals were struck with foreign governments on the heels of crucial diplomatic missions carried out by their powerful fathers. Often those foreign entities gained favorable policy actions from the United States government just as the sons were securing favorable financial deals from those same entities.
Nowhere is that more true than in their commercial dealings with Chinese government-backed enterprises.
Rosemont Seneca joined forces in doing business in China with another politically connected consultancy called the Thornton Group. 

The Massachusetts-based firm is headed by James Bulger, the nephew of the notorious mob hitman James “Whitey” Bulger. 

Whitey was the leader of the Winter Hill Gang, part of the South Boston mafia. 

Under indictment for 19 murders, he disappeared. 

He was later arrested, tried, and convicted.
James Bulger’s father, Whitey’s younger brother, Billy Bulger, serves on the board of directors of the Thornton Group. 

He was the longtime leader of the Massachusetts state Senate and, with their long overlap by state and by party, a political ally of Massachusetts Senator John Kerry.
Less than a year after opening Rosemont Seneca’s doors, Hunter Biden and Devon Archer were in China, having secured access at the highest levels. 

Thornton Group’s account of the meeting on their Chinese-language website was telling: Chinese executives “extended their warm welcome” to the “Thornton Group, with its US partner Rosemont Seneca chairman Hunter Biden (second son of the now Vice President Joe Biden).”
The purpose of the meetings was to “explore the possibility of commercial cooperation and opportunity.” 

Curiously, details about the meeting do not appear on their English-language website.
Also, according to the Thornton Group, the three Americans met with the largest and most powerful government fund leaders in China — even though Rosemont was both new and small.
The timing of this meeting was also curious. 

It occurred just hours before Hunter Biden’s father, the vice president, met with Chinese President Hu in Washington as part of the Nuclear Security Summit.

Chris Heinz (left) with John Kerry at a campaign fundraiser, April 16, 2004.

There was a second known meeting with many of the same Chinese financial titans in Taiwan in May 2011. 

For a small firm like Rosemont Seneca with no track record, it was an impressive level of access to China’s largest financial players. 

And it was just two weeks after Joe Biden had opened up the US-China strategic dialogue with Chinese officials in Washington.
On one of the first days of December 2013, Hunter Biden was jetting across the Pacific Ocean aboard Air Force Two with his father and daughter Finnegan. 

The vice president was heading to Asia on an extended official trip. 

Tensions in the region were on the rise.
The American delegation was visiting Japan, China, and South Korea. 

But it was the visit to China that had the most potential to generate conflict and controversy. 

The Obama administration had instituted the “Asia Pivot” in its international strategy, shifting attention away from Europe and toward Asia, where China was flexing its muscles.
For Hunter Biden, the trip coincided with a major deal that Rosemont Seneca was striking with the state-owned Bank of China. 

From his perspective, the timing couldn’t have been better.
Vice President Biden, Hunter Biden and Finnegan arrived to a red carpet and a delegation of Chinese officials. 

Greeted by Chinese children carrying flowers, the delegation was then whisked to a meeting with Vice President Li Yuanchao and talks with Xi Jinping.
Hunter and Finnegan Biden joined the vice president for tea with US Ambassador Gary Locke at the Liu Xian Guan Teahouse in the Dongcheng District in Beijing. 

Where Hunter Biden spent the rest of his time on the trip remains largely a mystery. 

There are actually more reports of his daughter Finnegan’s activities than his.
What was not reported was the deal that Hunter was securing. 

Rosemont Seneca Partners had been negotiating an exclusive deal with Chinese officials, which they signed approximately 10 days after Hunter visited China with his father. 

The most powerful financial institution in China, the government’s Bank of China, was setting up a joint venture with Rosemont Seneca.
The Bank of China is an enormously powerful financial institution. 

But the Bank of China is very different from the Bank of America. 

The Bank of China is government-owned, which means that its role as a bank blurs into its role as a tool of the government. 

The Bank of China provides capital for “China’s economic statecraft,” as scholar James Reilly puts it. 

Bank loans and deals often occur within the context of a government goal.
Rosemont Seneca and the Bank of China created a $1 billion investment fund called Bohai Harvest RST (BHR), a name that reflected who was involved. 

Bohai (or Bo Hai), the innermost gulf of the Yellow Sea, was a reference to the Chinese stake in the company. 

The “RS” referred to Rosemont Seneca. The “T” was Thornton.

The fund enjoyed an unusual and special status in China. 

BHR touted its “unique Sino-US shareholding structure” and “the global resources and network” that allowed it to secure investment “opportunities.” 

Funds were backed by the Chinese government.
In short, the Chinese government was literally funding a business that it co-owned along with the sons of two of America’s most powerful decision makers.
The partnership between American princelings and the Chinese government was just a beginning. 

The actual investment deals that this partnership made were even more problematic. 

Many of them would have serious national security implications for the United States.
In 2015, BHR joined forces with the automotive subsidiary of the Chinese state-owned military aviation contractor Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC) to buy American “dual-use” parts manufacturer Henniges.
AVIC is a major military contractor in China. 

It operates “under the direct control of the State Council” and produces a wide array of fighter and bomber aircraft, transports, and drones — primarily designed to compete with the United States.
The company also has a long history of stealing Western technology and applying it to military systems. 

The year before BHR joined with AVIC, the Wall Street Journal reported that the aviation company had stolen technologies related to the US F-35 stealth fighter and incorporated them in their own stealth fighter, the J-31. 

AVIC has also been accused of stealing US drone systems and using them to produce their own.
In September 2015, when AVIC bought 51 percent of American precision-parts manufacturer Henniges, the other 49 percent was purchased by the Biden-and-Kerry-linked BHR.
Henniges is recognized as a world leader in anti-vibration technologies in the automotive industry and for its precise, state-of-the-art manufacturing capabilities. 

Anti-vibration technologies are considered “dual-use” because they can have a military application, according to both the State Department and Department of Commerce.
The technology is also on the restricted Commerce Control List used by the federal government to limit the exports of certain technologies. 

For that reason, the Henniges deal would require the approval of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), which reviews sensitive business transactions that may have a national security implication.
According to BHR internal documents, the Henniges deal included “arduous and often-times challenging negotiations.” 

The CFIUS review in 2015 included representatives from numerous government agencies including John Kerry’s State Department.
The deal was approved in 2015.