In GOP impeachment inquiry, texts don’t prove Joe Biden was ‘in business’ with Hunter Biden

Jesse Watters

Statement: James Biden’s text message to Hunter Biden that read, “I can work with you(r) father alone,” shows that Joe Biden was “in business” with Hunter Biden.

A text message emerged as a central point of contention during House Republicans’ first impeachment inquiry hearing into President Joe Biden, with members of Congress arguing about its authenticity and context.

During a Sept. 28 segment of Fox News’ "The Five," host Jesse Watters seized on the moment from the hearing held earlier that day. He quoted just one line from a December 2018 text message exchange between James Biden, the president’s brother, and Hunter Biden, the president’s son. It read, "I can work with you(r) father alone."

Watters said the line from the message shows that Joe Biden was "in business" with Hunter Biden. Republican lawmakers have been working to build a case that the president was involved in his son’s business deals.

"So there goes the, ‘I was never in business with my son,’" Watters said, referring to the White House’s response to those claims. "Because not only were you in business with your son, you were in business with your brother."

But Watters misleads by citing only a single line from the text exchange. A longer summary of the message exchange that was included in an IRS whistleblower’s affidavit shows James Biden’s message to Hunter Biden was about personal financial matters, not business.

We contacted Fox News for comment but received no reply.

A text message kerfuffle

During the Sept. 28 impeachment inquiry hearing, Rep. Byron Donalds, R-Fla., displayed an image that looked like an iPhone screenshot.

"Hunter Biden was in a bad way, by the way," Donalds said, introducing the message. "He was really strung out. He lost a bunch of money. He needed help."

Later in the hearing, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., said the image had been "fabricated" and was "not the actual, direct screenshot from that phone." She asked to share what she called the "full context" of the message exchange.

"What was brought out from that fabricated image excluded critical context that changed the underlying meaning," Ocasio-Cortez said, holding up a printed document that was a portion of the source material for the message Donalds had displayed.

The text message exchange is from Exhibit 402 in an Aug. 2 affidavit submitted by Joseph Ziegler, an IRS whistleblower who was part of the agency’s criminal investigation into Hunter Biden. Ziegler described the exhibit as "a summary of WhatsApp messages" that he and the investigative team had drafted using "relevant messages from the various Electronic Search Warrant(s)."

Read in full, Exhibit 402 provides additional context for the messages between James Biden and Hunter Biden. Ellipses show that some information, deemed irrelevant by investigators, was left out. The exhibit detailed messages between James Biden, referred to as James B., and Hunter Biden, who is sometimes referred to as SM in investigation documents.

The investigators’ summary of the exchange is below, copied exactly as it appeared in the affidavit exhibit, including typos. We put in bold the section that was highlighted by both Watters and Donalds:

The summarized exchange shows that James Biden offered to work with Joe Biden to help Hunter cover alimony payments, tuition and the cost of food and gasoline. James Biden’s message is about Hunter’s personal financial matters, not business deals.

After House Republicans released IRS whistleblower documents — including Exhibit 402 — on Sept. 27, White House spokesperson Ian Sams said on X, formerly Twitter, that the documents were "another total bust" and showed "zero evidence of wrongdoing by Joe Biden."

House Republicans in recent months have released financial records that show an intricate web of foreign payments made to Biden family business associates and at least three Biden family members, including Hunter Biden and James Biden. Those records have not provided evidence that foreign payments went to President Joe Biden or that the president committed wrongdoing.

Our ruling

Watters said James Biden’s text message to Hunter Biden that read, "I can work with you(r) father alone," shows that Joe Biden was "in business" with Hunter Biden.

But Watters took out of context a single sentence from a longer exchange. A longer summary of the message exchange shows James Biden offered to work with Joe Biden to help Hunter cover alimony payments, tuition and the cost of food and gasoline. The message was not about business deals.

We rate this claim False.

PolitiFact Researcher Caryn Baird contributed to this report. 

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Texts don’t prove that Joe Biden was ‘in business’ with Hunter Biden