# The Hunter Biden Investigation {thread started in 2019}, Hunter Pardoned on December 1, 2024
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964
**Category:** Politics & Elections
**Created:** [September 28, 2019, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964 "2019-09-28T19:54:19Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 60
### Author:  [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1183 "2024-06-05T17:51:08Z")
> [@rocking\_chair](#):
>
> i’m really surprized they brought this case. usually federal prosecutors don’t do this unless they are super duper double sure they will win.
It’s not really about Hunter, of course.
> **[Analysis: The new twist in Hunter Biden’s case is a huge political headache...](https://www.cnn.com/2023/08/11/politics/hunter-biden-investigation-joe-biden/index.html)**
>
> A sudden new twist in the investigation into Hunter Biden means his legal tribulations will likely stretch on for months, creating an unwelcome new drag on his father’s White House and reelection bid.
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### Author:  [@rocking\_chair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rocking_chair)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1184 "2024-06-05T17:51:31Z")
i believe they meant “right now” as in the day you are signing this or possibly with in a brief time of signing this.
for example:
he signed the gun form on x day, and hadn’t used drugs in the last week plus.
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### Author:  [@filmore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/filmore)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1185 "2024-06-05T18:12:52Z")
I believe it’s this question from “ATF Form 4473” that he answered as “No”:
> [@](#):
>
> Are you an unlawful **user of** , or **addicted to** , marijuana or any depressant, stimulant, narcotic drug, or any other controlled substance?
> Warning: The use or possession of marijuana remains unlawful under Federal law regardless of whether it has been legalized or decriminalized
> for medicinal or recreational purposes in the state where you reside.
There is some wiggle room for the signer since the terms “user of” and “addicted to” aren’t clarified. As I mentioned, an addict will often be in complete denial that they are addicted. They’ll say they aren’t addicted, and I believe they actually believe that. However, I don’t really believe that they don’t consider themselves users. I think the defense should point out that the term is not defined, so it’s up to personal interpretation and not really enforceable. It would be like if a speed limit sign said “Not too fast” rather than “55MPH”. The form should have spelled out what is meant by “user of” and “addicted to” so it’s not up to personal interpretation.
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### Author:  [@rocking\_chair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rocking_chair)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1186 "2024-06-05T18:24:47Z")
and that is how you introduce reasonable doubt.
per cnn:
Court has resumed after a one-hour lunch break.
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### Author:  [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1187 "2024-06-05T18:29:13Z")
Thanks for posting that, @filmore! I was trying to find the exact wording but failing.
Grammatically, it’s a weird construction. “Unlawful” is an adjective that modifies the noun “user,” which itself is a person-noun. To agree with that is to agree that you’re unlawful, which is borderline nonsense.
They should have used the adverbial form “unlawfully” to refer to the verb “use”, as in, “Do you unlawfully use…” Or, preferably, “In the past thirty days, have you unlawfully used…”
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### Author:  [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1188 "2024-06-05T18:31:55Z")
> [@filmore](#):
>
> There is some wiggle room for the signer since the terms “user of” and “addicted to” aren’t clarified.
I used cocaine yesterday, but I quit, so I’m not a user anymore, I’m an ex-user.
I’m also not addicted… see above.
A better question would be “Within the last 30 days, have you used blah or blah or blah?”
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### Author:  [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1189 "2024-06-05T18:33:23Z")
> [@Cheesesteak](#):
>
> I used cocaine yesterday, but I quit, so I’m not a user anymore, I’m an ex-user.
[ ](https://i.imgur.com/e6Dp3Q4.jpeg)
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### Author:  [@Jack\_Batty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jack_Batty)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1190 "2024-06-05T18:44:14Z")
You know, it’s not just that this case would never have been undertaken had it not been Joe Biden’s son, but even if it was Cletus Hatfield McCoy who was under these charges, it would probably be pled out before noon between expired licenses cases. But instead we get entire new channels dedicated to the outcome.
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### Author:  [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1191 "2024-06-05T18:50:04Z")
> [@PhillyGuy](#):
>
> This seems to strain at making an excuse for Hunter (assuming allegations turn out to be proven).
>
> Almost everyone agrees that cocaine is worse than marijuana (or that marijuana isn’t bad at all).
Both are equally illegal under Federal law. If you are a regular Pot user, you can not buy a gun legally.
> [@rocking\_chair](#):
>
> As he neared the end of his questioning, Hunter Biden’s attorney Abbe Lowell tried to undermine the credibility of the laptop and the authenticity of the messages found on the device.
Where is the chain of evidence for the Laptop?
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### Author:  [@Aspenglow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspenglow)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1192 "2024-06-05T18:58:42Z")
Re the laptop:
This is only a guess, because I don’t know what if any in limine motions were made in this case.
My pure speculation is that the laptop was the subject of such a motion by the defense in an effort to keep it out based on its questionable provenance.
The judge might have denied the motion and said something like, look, I can’t tell the prosecution how to run their case and so I’m going to allow them to offer the laptop. But of course you, the defendant, are free to question the legitimacy or credibility of any “proof” the prosecutors try to introduce that flows from it.
Hope this helps.
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### Author:  [@rocking\_chair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rocking_chair)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1193 "2024-06-05T19:03:12Z")
per cnn:
After a lunch break, Zoe Kestan, Hunter Biden’s ex-girlfriend, continued to testify about how she saw Hunter Biden use drugs at various places the two stayed.
Kestan told jurors that Biden said he would go to rehab but when he stopped answering her messages, she used her laptop to open his banking records and saw he had withdrawn cash far away from the rehab facility.
When she asked him about the rehab, Biden told her something along the lines of: “Don’t worry about it,” she testified.
At another time, Kestan testified that Biden had offered a “young woman who was homeless” to stay with him at a hotel.
Hunter Biden later left that hotel in a rush, according to Kestan, and asked her to clean up the hotel room.
Pictures of the hotel room were shown to the jury and Kestan pointed out several crack pipes, one of which was broken, as well as baking powder, spoons, bowls and chopsticks — all used for the drugs he was taking, she testified.
Prosecutors have now elicited direct eyewitness testimony of Hunter Biden doing drugs as late as mid-September 2018, several weeks before he bought the gun at the heart of this case.
Biden’s former girlfriend Zoe Kestan testified that she witnessed him smoking crack during one of their liaisons in Malibu, California, over several days in September 2018.
This could help the prosecutors because they need to prove Biden was using drugs around when he bought the gun in 2018.
The indictment says while buying the revolver in Delaware, Biden lied on a federal form, swearing that he was not using, and was not addicted to, any illegal drugs — even though he was struggling with crack cocaine addiction at the time of the purchase.
Kestan also testified that Biden also wrote in a text message, “I’ll always be an addict.”
Prosecutors have finished the direct examination of Zoe Kestan, Hunter Biden’s ex-girlfriend. Abbe Lowell is conducting the cross examination and asked about her communications with the special counsel’s office.
Kestan described her many contacts with prosecutors, including a 3-hour session as recently as Monday. She was first interviewed in January 2022, then testified to the grand jury in February 2022. She had a subsequent meeting with Weiss’ team in July 2022.
In the last few weeks, in the run-up to the trial, she had another 3 meetings with special counsel prosecutors, totaling approximately 6 hours.
This is not uncommon for a key government witness. But defense attorneys often highlight these extensive contacts between a witness and the prosecutors to suggest a coziness between the two.
Kestan also confirmed that Weiss’ team granted her immunity in exchange for her cooperation with her probe.
Prosecutors have called called Gordon Cleveland, the man who sold Hunter Biden a gun in October 2018, to the stand.
Zoe Kestan is finished testifying. Toward the end of her testimony, she said that she was not aware what Biden was doing in October 2018, the month he bought the gun.
rc: huh. well that’s not helpful to the prosecution.
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### Author:  [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1194 "2024-06-05T19:11:50Z")
> [@rocking\_chair](#):
>
> from what i am seeing they are relying on the laptop and hunter’s book.
So… A laptop that was in the possession of who the hell knows for a time period of who the hell knows.
And a book, published by the accused.
Sounds like crap to me.
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### Author:  [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1195 "2024-06-05T19:13:15Z")
> [@Railer13](#):
>
> If Hunter is found not guilty, the MAGAts will have more fuel for their claim that our judicial system is corrupt and is biased against True Patriots.
If Hunter is found guilty and is not immediately sentence to death by lethal injection that afternoon, the MAGAts will have more fuel for their claim that our judicial system is corrupt and is biased against True Patriots.
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### Author:  [@rocking\_chair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rocking_chair)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1196 "2024-06-05T19:49:08Z")
per cnn:
The gun purchased by Hunter Biden in 2018 was shown to the jury Wednesday during the testimony of Gordon Cleveland, a former employee of the gun store.
Cleveland testified that Biden said he was “looking for a firearm.”
When asked if he wanted a semi-automatic gun or a revolver, Biden said he wanted a revolver, Cleveland said.
Prosecutor Derek Hines showed Cleveland a revolver sitting inside a box, which Cleveland confirmed was the gun he sold Biden.
Gordon Cleveland testified that he told Hunter Biden to “take your time” in filling out the [required federal form](https://www.ded.uscourts.gov/sites/ded/files/GTX10A.pdf) before Hunter Biden bought a gun in 2018.
Cleveland said he always told people to take their time with the form because some people would fill it out incorrectly and mess up the sale.
The former gun store employee also said he watched Hunter Biden mark “no” on the question of whether he was a user of illegal drugs.
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### Author:  [@Superdude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superdude)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1197 "2024-06-05T19:56:08Z")
> [@Jack\_Batty](#):
>
> My prediction: guilty, fine, probation, forgotten by next month … except for right-wing loons who will screech about the president’s crime family. Nothingburger with cheese.
Not just that, but they’ll continue to bitch about the weaponization of the Biden DoJ, even though Biden has stayed out of the Hunter case.
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### Author:  [@rocking\_chair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rocking_chair)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1198 "2024-06-05T20:16:51Z")
per cnn:
Former gun shop employee Gordon Cleveland testified that Hunter Biden paid in cash for the gun he purchased in 2018.
Cleveland said that Biden told him to keep the change left over, but he decided to leave the extra money in an envelope at the store.
“I don’t keep tips,” Cleveland said.
Cleveland testified he stopped working at the store in 2021 due to health issues.
He is now being cross examined by defense attorney Abbe Lowell.
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### Author:  [@filmore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/filmore)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 8:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1199 "2024-06-05T20:22:54Z")
Is there any mention as to why Cleveland has such a detailed memory of this transaction? Does he remember all his sales with this level of detail? Or was it that he realized it was ~~the president’s son~~ politician Joe Biden’s son and so it stands out?
(ETA carrps comment)
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### Author:  [@carrps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carrps)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1200 "2024-06-05T20:25:33Z")
Well, technically, at the time. he wasn’t the President’s son.
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### Author:  [@rocking\_chair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rocking_chair)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1201 "2024-06-05T20:44:23Z")
per cnn:
On cross-examination, Hunter Biden’s defense attorney Abbe Lowell pressed the man who sold Hunter Biden a gun in 2018 about how he saw him arrive at the store.
“Did you see through the wall?” Lowell asked.
The gun store employee, Gordon Cleveland, said no, he eventually saw the car through the store window.
Lowell said in opening statements that Hunter was only in the area to buy a new phone.
Cleveland testified that Hunter pulled into the parking lot of the gun shop from the direction of an AT&T store across the street.
The gun salesman, Gordon Cleveland, embraced his reputation as a “whale hunter,” chuckling when Hunter Biden’s defense attorney brought up the term and bragging about his ability to close deals for pricey guns.
The defense is pursuing this line of inquiry [because in opening statements](https://www.cnn.com/2024/06/04/politics/takeaways-day-2-hunter-biden-federal-gun-trial) it told the jury that Cleveland essentially peddled the gun to Hunter Biden.
> “I could sell whatever you had. It’s just what I did,” he said, explaining why his colleagues called him a whale hunter. This included attempts to push his customers to buy more expensive guns, he conceded.
But Cleveland said he did that because the pricier guns are more reliable and high quality.
He wouldn’t peddle “junk” onto customers, Cleveland said.
The jury has been excused for the day in the Hunter Biden trial.
The court will resume Thursday at 9 a.m. ET with Gordon Cleveland, an employee at the gun store, back on the stand.
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### Author:  [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2024, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hunter-biden-investigation-thread-started-in-2019-hunter-pardoned-on-december-1-2024/840964/1202 "2024-06-05T20:47:54Z")
> [@Superdude](#):
>
> > [@Jack\_Batty](#):
> >
> > My prediction: guilty, fine, probation, forgotten by next month … except for right-wing loons who will screech about the president’s crime family. Nothingburger with cheese.
>
> Not just that, but they’ll continue to bitch about the weaponization of the Biden DoJ, even though Biden has stayed out of the Hunter case.
Not to mention that the DoJ had already been weaponized by his predecessor.
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