When the official court transcript from Hunter Biden’s foiled plea agreement hearing Wednesday in Delaware was posted online late Wednesday evening, I went through it with a fine-tooth comb to see what happened, intending to analyze it here at RedState. As the hours wore on, I threw my hot takes up on Twitter. That thread (the beginning of it, anyway) now has more than 1 million views and has been referenced/read from on the Dan Bongino Show and Timcast and possibly others.

Now we have the full plea agreement document and the diversion agreement document, neither of which were available when I was reading the court transcript last night (or at least that I hadn’t seen, since I was concentrating). I’m still creating my analysis post, incorporating both of those documents and with the benefit of sleep and further information (such as the juvenile response by Hunter Biden’s legal team, which confirms some of my hot take thoughts), but thought RedState readers who aren’t on Twitter might enjoy this. Warning, I copy/pasted it from my Twitter so it’s quick-and-dirty and I can’t guarantee perfect spelling or punctuation. Oh, and there might be a cuss word or two sprinkled in.

Here’s the link to my Twitter thread…and here goes!

I’ve been reading the official transcript of Hunter Biden’s hearing today (110 pgs) and not all the way through but something that strikes me so far: US Atty Weiss’ office was really trying to game the system bc they hid the agreement to not charge various things related to the tax case in the Diversion Agreement, which covers the gun charges, instead of in the Memorandum of Plea bc that changes the TYPE of plea it is under the FRCP and the role of the judge. The judge and her staff could not find another case in which a plea agreement was done that way.

She asks if she can reject the plea on grounds it contains an agmt to not charge she doesn’t fully understand, after basically getting Wise to admit they don’t want her to have latitude on whether to accept the plea or not “in the interest of justice.” They want her hands tied, but w/o giving full info.

She calls it out, though… after getting Wise to admit there is an ongoing investigation, but he says he’s not in a position to say why they’re doing it piecemeal.

Holy shit. Wise tries to “used car salesman” the judge. From what I’ve read so far he should be facing some ethics inquiries.

And again, holy shit. After Clark implies that charges came after a “full” 5-yr investigation, he gives up the plot w/Weiss’ office: Give the judge a type of Plea Agreement she can’t reject, and then bury the immunity in the Diversion Agreement and tell the judge she also has to accept that. “I mean, the original conception here was something like a deferred prosecution — non-prosecution agreement, which generally the Court doesn’t necessarily weigh in on” then tells her they don’t want her to rule on the Diversion Agreement, that probation has accepted it and she arraigned Hunter on it, so too bad, so sad.

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Judge basically says, uh-uh, f’k you, we’re gonna talk about the Diversion Agreement, bc you took things that would normally be in the Plea Agreement and put them into the Diversion Agreement, and you’re trying to say I can’t accept/reject, I have to just rubber stamp it pic.twitter.com/NJ5dIUjzJD

— Jennifer Van Laar (@jenvanlaar) July 27, 2023

Then Wise gets into gaslighting about whether the non-prosecution agreement is really part of the diversion agreement.

Every time I kinda miss my former career as a court reporter, I read exchanges like this and my BP spikes and… I suppose investigative journalism is better 😂

(The judge is referring to the Diversion Agreement) pic.twitter.com/uhddtZrT5v

— Jennifer Van Laar (@jenvanlaar) July 27, 2023

This is kinda hilarious, though. Wise trips over his words so badly, he almost makes KJP look good. He almost admits that the only function of Hunter Biden’s Diversion Agreement is to hide the non-prosecution agreement in the tax case (which, we’ll get to soon, specifically references lots of foreign companies) then admits that “it has no function but the parties negotiated that — their view…that the firearms offense should not be considered relevant conduct for calculating [sentencing] the guidelines related to the tax offense” BOOM! Do you see what he did there?

I’m still laughing… this judge is awesome. She didn’t even let on that she caught what slipped out of his mouth. He rambled on about this was really a contract btwn Hunter and the DOJ and should Hunter ever again find himself on the wrong end of an indictment, well, he could move to have charges dismissed. Wouldn’t we all like to have that? At least one problem is venue… small detail. Judge will allow counsel to keep walking down the path, though.

Wise says that in his understanding, under the Diversion Agreement DOJ cannot bring tax evasion charges against Hunter for the years ref’d in the factual statement, or firearms charges based on the ONE firearm identified in that factual basis. (Does Hunter even have that anymore? I can’t remember.)

Judge references foreign companies mentioned in facts section. Could they charge FARA? Yes, Wise says. Clark says, whoa, hey, hey, whatcha talkin’ about?

Also, how does this address venue? Some of the years mentioned Hunter lived in CA. Do they need Martin Estrada’s sign-off? Or is that just to prosecute?

Now, as @shipwreckedcrew, a former federal prosecutor and current federal criminal defense attorney, has observed, there’s a more than decent possibility that this build-up to the “then there’s no deal!” crescendo was role playing by Wise and Clark, that the deal needed to be scuttled due to everything that was revealed since the plea was announced, but Weiss’ office needed to save face. So keep that in mind as we move forward.

I’m still reading (though fading, admittedly) but since. many of you have asked for the link to the entire transcript, it’s here… be sure to throw a few dollars @MarcoPolo501c3‘s way for the work they do.

Speaking of throwing a few dollars someone’s way in appreciation for the work they do, RedState’s work is heavily supported by our RedState VIP program. In addition to supporting the work of myself and our other incredibly hard-working and talented writers, as a RedState VIP member you’ll enjoy an ad-free reading experience and access to exclusive columns and podcasts. And, in honor of Hunter’s foiled (so far) plea agreement, when you use code BIDENCRIMEFAMILY you’ll get 50% off.