Long-time Washington investigative reporter John Solomon announced on Monday that, with the help of the Southeastern Legal Foundation (SLF), he had filed a federal lawsuit against the U.S. State Department to “force disclosure of all communications records between the State Department (including the U.S. Embassy in Kiev) and Hunter Biden, Devon Archer, Burisma Holdings, Rosemont Seneca Partners, and/or Blue Star Strategies.”

Background:

Devon Archer is Hunter Biden’s business partner. They are co-owners of Rosemont Seneca Partners, LLC (RSP).

Burisma Holdings, is a Ukrainian energy company which paid large sums of money (a minimum of $166,000 per month) to RSP while Vice President Biden was serving as Obama’s “point man” for Ukraine. Solomon reported that the payments were made from the spring of 2014 through the fall of 2015. Also, both Hunter Biden and Devon Archer became members of Burisma’s board of directors.

At the time Biden became the U.S. “point man” on Ukraine in February 2014, President Viktor Yanukovych had sought asylum in Russia following the deadly “Orange Revolution,” and Putin had sent his forces into Crimea.

The Lawsuit:

Solomon had previously requested these documents through a May 6, 2019 Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. Because the State Department has failed to respond to this request, he has filed a lawsuit.

In 2018, while speaking to a group of foreign policy specialists, Joe Biden unwisely boasted that he had threatened to withhold $1 billion of U.S. loan guarantees to Ukraine (which would have put the country on the road to insolvency) if they did not fire Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin by the time he left the country. His plane was scheduled to depart in six hours.

Biden left out the fact that Shokin was investigating Burisma Holdings and was just about to question Hunter Biden about his dealings with the company.

Solomon first wrote about this story on April 1, 2019. Here is Joe Biden, in his own words, telling his audience what he’d said to Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko:

I said, ‘You’re not getting the billion.’ I’m going to be leaving here in, I think it was about six hours. I looked at them and said: ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money.’

Well, son of a bitch, he got fired. And they put in place someone who was solid at the time.

Solomon prefaces his comments by saying that “every American deserves the right to be presumed innocent until evidence is made public or a conviction is secured, especially when some matters of a case involve foreigners. The same presumption should be afforded to Joe Biden, Hunter Biden, Devon Archer and Burisma in the Ukraine case.

That said, he demands answers to the following questions:

Was it appropriate for your son and his firm to cash in on Ukraine while you served as point man for Ukraine policy?

What work was performed for the money Hunter Biden’s firm received?

Did you know about the Burisma probe?

And when it was publicly announced that your son worked for Burisma, should you have recused yourself from leveraging a U.S. policy to pressure the prosecutor who very publicly pursued Burisma?

He also wants to find out what the State Department knew about Hunter Biden’s dealings in Ukraine and Ukraine’s investigations into those business dealings?

SLF’s executive director Todd Young said that, in his FOIA requests, Solomon simply seeks to answer those questions. Mr. Solomon’s questions, stemming from years-long investigative journalism, are powerful and legitimate inquiries into what the American public has a right to know about how and why Vice President Biden and the Obama administration conducted foreign policy in the last week of its tenure. The well-documented series of events involving Ukraine begs for public disclosure.”

Click here for lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

I have written about Hunter Biden’s business dealings in Ukraine here and here. his business with China here, and the time he left his cocaine pipe and several other possessions in a rental car here.