Hunter Biden, who has acknowledged doing multiple rehab stints for his addictions, is suspected of smoking crack in a D.C. strip club when he was on the board of a Ukrainian natural gas company, The New York Post reported.
The suspected incident happened in late 2018 at Archibald’s Gentlemen’s Club in Washington, DC, and represents the most recent alleged drug use by Hunter, 49, according to The Post’s Page Six. Hunter, the son of 2020 Democratic presidential frontrunner and former Vice President Joe Biden, has been in rehab and struggled with drug and alcohol addiction including a crack binge in 2016.
Employees at the strip club told The Post they suspected Hunter used its VIP room to smoke crack. He was a regular there, they said, and dropped “thousands of dollars” during multiple visits. On at least one occasion, he was suspected of smoking crack there.
Former Archibald managing partner James Ritter said there was one occasion in late 2018 marked by a “suspicion of drug use.”
“There was a smell of burning Styrofoam in the VIP room. We told him nothing illegal can go on here,” Ritter told Page Six. “We didn’t see anything illegal. After he was spoken to, the smell stopped. VIP employees suspected it was crack.”
Ritter also said that Hunter paid his tab with credit cards that did not have his name on them. Archibald’s usual policy required customers’ credit cards to match photo identification. “Hunter was a bit of an exception,” Ritter said.
Hunter has repeatedly admitted that he made a “mistake” not calculating the political ramifications of joining the board of a Ukrainian natural gas company when his father had official business in the country as vice president. But he denied doing anything “improper” in an ABC News interview.
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Hunter described his dealings with the company, Burisma, as “poor judgment” that “gave a hook to some very unethical people to act in illegal ways to try to do some harm to my father.”
President Donald Trump has swamped his Twitter feed and campaign speeches with attacks on Hunter over his foreign business dealings. Biden has defended the ethical implications of his private ventures.
“Did I do anything improper? No, not in any way. Not in any way whatsoever,” he told ABC.
Republicans, however, are preparing to give Hunter “the Benghazi Treatment,” The New Republic reported. Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee failed to defend Trump in the impeachment hearings. Now they’ll go after the son of his leading opponent in the 2020 presidential race.
“Rather than attempt to raise legitimate counterclaims, they hope to undercut the clarity of these hearings by spraying squid ink everywhere,” Jason Linkins wrote for New Republic. “This sci-fi tapestry will undoubtedly include speculation about the infamous whistleblower and calls for their big reveal … And a leading figure in the upcoming fantasy saga will be Hunter Biden.”
At the time of the incident in the D.C. strip club, Hunter was a board member of the Ukrainian natural gas company Burisma, which reportedly paid him as much as $50,000 a month, New York Post reported.
Democrats allege that Trump withheld close to $400 million in military aid to Ukraine in an effort to force an investigation into corruption allegations against Hunter and Joe. Trump has denied any quid pro quo.
Hunter joined the Burisma board in April 2014 but turned down an offer to serve another term earlier this year due to the controversy, the New Yorker reported in July.
