WASHINGTON — First son Hunter Biden’s sentencing hearing on three federal gun felonies will be held Nov. 13 — eight days after the presidential election — according to a new scheduling order from judge Maryellen Noreika.
A Delaware jury on June 11 found Hunter, 54, guilty of illegally buying and possessing a Colt Cobra .38-caliber revolver in 2018. The case centered on his lying about his drug abuse on federal paperwork.
The first son faces up to 25 years in prison, but could receive as little as probation as his penalty.
Hunter Biden was the first child of a sitting president to face a federal criminal trial and he’s set to stand trial in a second case in Los Angeles — with proceedings set to begin Sept. 9 — for allegedly failing to pay $1.4 million in taxes between 2016 and 2019.
President Biden’s interactions with his relatives’ foreign business partners are the subject of an ongoing House impeachment inquiry into alleged corruption during Biden’s eight-year vice presidency — with a report expected from Republican investigators this month.
Hunter’s legal issues have lost much of their political saliency, however, since his 81-year-old father announced on July 21 that he was abandoning his campaign for a second term amid a Democratic mutiny over concerns about his mental acuity.
The gun and tax charges were brought last year after IRS whistleblowers Gary Shapley and Joseph Ziegler alleged a long-running Justice Department coverup to shield the first family — including by blocking the pursuit of leads related to the elder Biden and tipping off the family to investigative steps.
Shortly after the whistleblowers contacted Congress last April, Delaware US Attorney David Weiss brokered a probation-only plea deal for Hunter Biden on the gun and tax offenses.
That plea deal collapsed last July over courtroom demands by Hunter’s lawyers for even broader immunity for past conduct, including alleged violations of the Foreign Agents Registration Act, which could implicate his father.
Weiss was elevated to the rank of a special counsel last August by Attorney General Merrick Garland, who the IRS whistleblowers said misled Congress about the Delaware prosecutor’s prior ability to independently file charges outside his district.
The House impeachment inquiry is expected to end without a recommendation that Biden be removed from office. Narrow Republican control of the House made Biden’s impeachment unlikely even before he dropped his re-election bid and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris. The Democratic-held Senate was expected to defeat any such measure should it have passed.
The congressional inquiry developed evidence, however, that Joe Biden interacted with his son and brother James Biden’s associates from two Chinese government-linked business ventures and their patrons from Kazakhstan, Mexico, Russia and Ukraine, in addition to many of their domestic associates.
Joe Biden has consistently claimed he “never” discussed business with either his son or brother and said in December and again in March that he “did not” interact with their partners — despite photos, emails and witness statements indicating otherwise.
President Biden has vowed not to pardon Hunter, but sources close to the first family have told The Post they believe he could change his mind before leaving office on Jan. 20.
The president said he won’t pardon his son as he argued the legal system was not biased against Republicans — amid claims of persecution by former President Donald Trump, who was convicted May 30 in Manhattan on 34 state felony counts of falsifying business records to conceal 2016 hush money payments. He is currently set to be sentenced Sept. 18 in that case.
Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, also faces federal criminal cases for challenging Biden’s 2020 election victory and for allegedly mishandling classified records — with the latter case in flux after it was dismissed last month by the trial judge — as well as state election charges in Georgia.