Donald Trump has called on China to investigate his political rival Joe Biden, a demand that echoes the Ukraine controversy at the heart of his impeachment proceedings. Speaking to reporters on Thursday, the US president said China should probe the former vice-president and his son Hunter, linking the request to ongoing trade talks.
“If they don’t do what we want, we have tremendous, tremendous power,” Trump warned, referring to Chinese negotiators due in Washington next week. He denied having already asked President Xi Jinping to start an investigation but added: “It’s certainly something we can start thinking about.”
CNN reported that Trump had raised Biden in a June phone call with Xi, mentioning the Democrat’s political prospects and those of Senator Elizabeth Warren. The president also told Xi he would stay quiet on Hong Kong protests as long as trade talks progressed, according to the network. The White House record of that call was stored in a restricted database alongside the call with Ukraine’s president.
The remarks came as Kurt Volker, Trump’s former special envoy to Ukraine, testified to House committees about efforts by Trump and his lawyer Rudy Giuliani to obtain compromising material on the Bidens. Text messages provided by Volker included one from acting ambassador Bill Taylor calling it “crazy to withhold security assistance for help with a political campaign”.
Trump insisted he did nothing wrong, accusing the whistleblower of treason. However, he openly called for investigations by both Ukraine and China, saying: “If they were honest about it, they would start a major investigation into the Bidens.”
Hunter Biden served on the board of a Ukrainian energy company while his father was vice-president, and accompanied him on a 2013 trip to China as he set up a private equity fund. No evidence of wrongdoing has emerged.
