Talk:Hunter Biden

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This article has been mentioned by multiple media organizations: Isaac Stanley-Becker (September 25, 2019). "Checking the Web on Hunter Biden? A 36-year-old physicist helps decide what you'll see". Washington Post. Retrieved September 25, 2019. The page has been viewed nearly 230,000 times in the past 30 days, more than the page for Nancy Pelosi, the speaker of the House, or for Vice President Pence. Wikipedia dominates Google's search results and helps supply the information spit out by Siri and Amazon Alexa. C. Mitchell Shaw (September 27, 2019). "Wikipedia Editor Scrubs Citations to The New American from Hunter Biden Page". The New American. Retrieved September 30, 2019. One of the most recent examples of that — and one near to the heart of this magazine — involves biased editing of Wikipedia to remove damning information about Hunter Biden because of citations of The New American magazine.

This article has been viewed enough times in a single week to appear in the Top 25 Report 3 times. The weeks in which this happened: September 22 to 28, 2019 September 29 to October 5, 2019 September 27 to October 3, 2020

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Hunter Biden article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

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The article makes it sound like the conspiracy theory that "Biden wanted the prosecutor fired to protect his son" is the brunt of the criticism against Hunter Biden. It's not — the accusation being levied first and foremost is that Hunter got the Burisma job only because he's the son of Joe Biden, as a way for Burisma to have greater influence on the US government. That has not been debunked, and the fact that Hunter has very little qualification to sit on the board seems to support this narrative.

By attacking the strawman in the description at the top, the article makes it sound like no impropriety is taking place. I propose the last paragraph to be changed to: "Biden has stirred up controversy by serving on the board of Burisma Holdings, a major Ukrainian natural gas producer, from 2014 to 2019. He has been accused of getting this job only because of his connection to Joe Biden, as a way for the company to gain more US political influence."

Mirek2 (talk) 09:28, 2 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

If the brunt of the criticism is about potential nepotism then that is in and of itself weak sauce - "rich powerful mans son gets well paid job" is barely a criticism or a controversy (otherwise we'd be here all night dealing with Trump, Trumps kids and their partners, and Trumps donors).

As for his qualification and suitability: He is both an attorney and professional consultant employed to lead on corlorate governance best practice. Find one reliable source that says he is not qualified for that job based upon his past experience, qualification and background? You can't, because his background and qualification would lend itself to that role.

There are sources that discuss if it was appropriate, but these largely predate the conspiracy theories and are largely criticism from within the Democrat base so not some grand controversy. Koncorde (talk) 12:39, 2 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

the accusation being levied first and foremost is that Hunter got the Burisma job only because he's the son of Joe Biden is incorrect. Nepotism has been ubiquitous in this world since forever, but that said, there isn’t even evidence of nepotism here, but even if there were and that’s all this is about, it wouldn’t be worth any attention. The real reason Hunter Biden has received any attention is to fabricate a transparent political smearjob against his father, and I suspect everyone will suddenly lose all interest in Hunter Biden within days now. soibangla (talk) 18:20, 2 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

This isn't a Trump vs. Biden point. This is an objective point, that in no way shape or form has he been exonerated of wrongdoing, but that is how the article reads. The bias here is so obvious, and only leads to further polarization. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.7.233.239 (talk) 20:47, 4 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

He hasn't been exonerated because he hasn't been charged with anything. Instead the unsupported conspiracy theories have been debunked, repeatedly. Do you think if there was evidence of Biden (either) committing illegal acts it wouldn't have been presented already? Instead Trump was impeached and not a single witness called mentioned any legitimacy to the accusations against either Biden (nor where there any whistle blowers). Etc etc. This is not polarizing unless you want to believe that the smoke from Trump campaign is somehow evidence of a raging fire for Biden. Koncorde (talk) 21:56, 5 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Should we change it from debunked to fringe or simply right wing conspiracy theories? I think half the country would not agree with this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Allsparkwars1 (talk • contribs) 20:38, 5 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

We say "debunked" because that is what they are. Wikipedia is not censored in the interests of political correctness. XOR'easter (talk) 21:51, 5 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

This edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.

Please add to the Personal section:

Hunter Biden served as the Board Chair of the United Nations World Food Program USA (WFP USA), which was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2020. He also served as chair of the fundraising wing for WFP-USA.

Sources:

https://www.wfpusa.org/news-release/vice-president-joe-biden-and-world-food-program-usa-honor-former-senator-bob-dole-for-his-leadership-in-the-fight-against-hunger/

https://www.wfpusa.org/multimedia/hunter-and-beau-biden-discuss-wfp-usas-live-below-the-line-challenge-with-msnbcs-andrea-mitchell/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/reliable-source/wp/2014/08/07/hunter-biden-amateur-cook-and-embarrassing-dad/ Emilyr2012 (talk) 09:35, 10 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

 Not done for now: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the {{edit extended-protected}} template. We do not need to mention they were awarded a Nobel Peace Prize in his article, unless linked prominently by third-party sources. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 11:21, 10 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

The New York Post recently ran a story that claimed they have obtained emails which show Hunter Biden arranged meetings between Joe Biden and a senior official from a Ukrainian energy firm. There are questions about the emails' authenticity and the reliability of the story in general.^[1][2] In the interest of WP:BLP and since NYPost is not considered a reliable source, let's not add information about this story to the article until there are better sources. – Anne drew 19:24, 14 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I concur. XOR'easter (talk) 19:37, 14 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Seems to be a very odd series of events, too. What are the odds that Hunter Biden, who lives in California, would take his computer that contains information where he talked to the 2nd most powerful man in the world to a small computer shop that is not even in his own state? No reliable sources have confirmed these events. Pennsylvania2 (talk) 22:21, 14 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

The AP writeup makes it pretty clear that the authenticity of the e-mails is very much in question. And according to the NYT,

Last month, United States intelligence analysts contacted several people with knowledge of the Burisma hack for further information after they had picked up chatter that stolen Burisma emails would be leaked in the form of an “October surprise.” Among their chief concerns, according to people familiar with the discussions, was that the Burisma material would be leaked alongside forged materials in an attempt to hurt Mr. Biden’s candidacy — as Russian hackers did when they dumped real emails alongside forgeries ahead of the 2017 French elections — a slight twist on Russia’s 2016 playbook when they siphoned leaked D.N.C. emails through fake personas on Twitter and WikiLeaks.

XOR'easter (talk) 06:45, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

The NY Post story appears to be a medley of baseless claims and questionable evidence. Politicised news have no place in Wikipedia. Glucken123 (talk) 09:48, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

• The background is also, to put it charitably, wildly implausible. Oh, sure, it's possible that a computer store would go to right wing hacks rather than the well-known and easily contacted family that would very obviously be able to pay their bill, but it's rather more likely that Rudy Giuliani, whose associates include known Russian intelligence agents, has been given data stolen by the GRU - because that is exactly what happened with WikiLeaks in 2016, and the Russians are not exactly known for changing a winning formula. Guy (help! - typo?) 10:01, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Exactly. Additionally, it is useful to look at Washington Post's investigations into the matter. NY Post has been complaining about social media censorship (which I also found a bit extreme - especially on Twitter), but on the other hand there is absolutely no doubt that most of the "evidence" presented in the article seems false, misleading and the result of hacking (again!). Therefore, I agree with you that NY Post's leaving us with no choice here. This is garbage. Glucken123 (talk) 14:41, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Similar situation to the Steele Dossier, in my opinion. Nobody wanted to publish the dossier, but after Buzzfeed did then the mainstream outlets reported that Buzzfeed reported it. The claims in the story could be dubious, but it wouldn't be appropriate to not report on the subsequent firestorm of stories from many reputable sources. The overall impact of this story on history is massive, because let's not forget that Trump was impeached because of his actions regarding the allegations. Mr Ernie (talk) 15:02, 15 October 2020 (UTC) Mr Ernie (talk) 15:02, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Mr Ernie, no, not the same at all. The allegation that Hunter Biden influenced his father to get Shokin removed to protect his employer has been extensively discussed in the past, and is well known to be false. Removing Shokin was the official policy of the US, EU, IMF and World Bank. All of them were calling for Shokin's removal before Joe Biden ever got involved. The first motion to remove Shokin was introduced in July 2015 by Yehor Soboliev. Removing Shokin made it more likely that Burisma would be prosecuted, not less.

We should cover the story, but we should follow the reliable independent sources, which point this out, and also point out that the source of the purported (and unverified) emails is very likely the Kremlin. Guy (help! - typo?) 15:22, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I agree with you. We can't bury any mention of this, because it actually is hugely important, but not necessarily for the reasons the NYPost is reporting. There's also the secondary effect it is having on "censorship," as Trump's campaign twitter and the House Judiciary twitter have been locked for sharing it. That is YUGE - a company limiting what official government accounts can share because of potential misinformation. The articles I linked have good details.

And yes, it is the same as the Steele Dossier, including the potential that Russian disinformation could be behind this too. Mr Ernie (talk) 15:29, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Mr Ernie, it's not hugely important, it's actually very trivial. But it's in the news and it looks weird not to discuss it.

US involvement in Ukraine has been less than stellar (e.g. Rick Perry acting as fixer for donors to get a multi-million-dollar gas deal), but the claim that Joe Biden did anything to protect Hunter's income has been extensively investigated and is false. Unlike the idea that the Trump regime has pushed for Ukraine to open an investigation into Hunter Biden and Burisma, which they had repeatedly not done due to lack of evidence. No doubt they are disappointed that the investigation only covers events before Hunter Biden joined the board. My personal belief is that the involvement of serious people like Aleksander Kwaśniewski probably represented something of a turning point in Burisma, though he himself ias a - ahem - colourful character. Hunter Biden was actually tasked with looking at corporate governance policies in the firm. But I'm not an expert on Eastern European oil and gas oligarchies. Guy (help! - typo?) 15:31, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I’m not sure what you are responding to. I’ve never claimed Hunter Biden did anything inappropriate. Mr Ernie (talk) 15:48, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

FWIW, the New York Post story has been shared over 321,000 times on Facebook and accumulated 1.2 million engagements [1], so whatever they said they were doing about "throttling its spread" was probably not a very drastic move. Twitter was following a pre-existing policy they've had for two years and which has impacted left-leaning sites too. I would be hesitant to write article text about this until the partisan sound-and-fury had been analyzed and given context by good secondary sources. XOR'easter (talk) 16:15, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

The first description of him is a Lawyer, however nothing in the article suggests he ever practiced law and so it appears undue to use that as the first description of him. I'm not suggesting describing him as a lobbyist as that could appear to have negative connotations, but perhaps "businessman" is a more accurate description of him. Pi (Talk to me!) 22:37, 14 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Multiple articles state that Hunter was of counsel at the law firm Boies Schiller Flexner. I found that he is admitted to practice law in Connecticut as of 2014 - https://federalnewsnetwork.com/government-news/2014/10/bidens-son-faces-no-bar-review-after-discharge/ Some of everything (talk) 00:18, 15 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]