Republicans have long accused Hunter Biden — the son of President Joe Biden — of taking a board seat on a Ukrainian gas company called Burisma, which he held from 2014 to 2019, in exchange for influence in US – Ukraine policy decisions.
The claims led to investigations in both the House and the Senate, which led to myriad issues, as the conservative-led inquiries became a means to undermine President Joe Biden’s credibility by targeting his son.
But the same Senators and House members behind the investigations are now silent as Donald Trump’s son, Donald Trump Jr, takes board seats at two companies in advance of his father’s second term. The move, like Hunter Biden’s board seat, raises concerns that his inclusion could sway key policy decisions affecting those businesses.
In the last week, Trump Jr took a board seat at Public Square — an e-commerce platform that labels itself as “anti-woke” and aligns itself with conservative brands and products, and Unusual Machines — a Florida-based manufacturer of drone components.
Is there a difference?
Hunter Biden’s board seat, the alleged conflicts that came along with it, and the plethora of unrelated crimes and personal issues – including tax evasion and the lying about drug use when attempting to buy a firearm, for which President Biden recently pardoned him — prompted right-wing outrage.
While Hunter Biden has been credibly accused and charged with crimes, he had no official connection to the White House. He did not hold an advisory role within the Obama administration when his father was the vice president. He has also not held any advisory role in the current administration, or with his father’s re-election campaign, while it lasted. Although Hunter may have suggested he had influence, that does not mean he actually did.
In fact, in 2020, the GOP-led Senate Homeland Security Committee concluded that Hunter Biden did not have any influence in policy decisions. The committee found no evidence of wrongdoing by then-Vice President Biden and discovered that his connections did not change any policies between the United States and Ukraine to benefit his son’s interests.
Yet, other Republicans then made Hunter Biden the target of their efforts and have continued to do so. Just last week, Ohio Republican Representative Jim Jordan said he would investigate the special counsel’s handling of the Biden case.
Jordan has not mentioned Trump’s comparable conflict of interest with his oldest son’s new board seats. He did not respond to Al Jazeera’s request for comment. Neither did Representative James Comer from Kentucky, who chaired the Oversight Committee.
However, Trump Jr’s roles could affect policy decisions because, unlike Hunter Biden, Trump Jr has been closely entangled with the decision-making process in both the former Trump administration and the upcoming one. While President-elect Trump has said his children will not have a role in his second term, they are reportedly still advising the president-elect on current policy decisions and political appointments.
For instance, Trump Jr has been a key voice pushing for nominees like Tulsi Gabbard for director of national intelligence. Even before that, he pushed Trump to choose his friend JD Vance to be his running mate.
In the first Trump Administration, Trump Jr served in an informal advisory role. He also served as a surrogate for the administration’s interests, appearing on friendly right-wing media programmes including on Fox News and Newsmax.
On the other hand, Hunter Biden was neither a surrogate for the Biden administration nor for the Biden campaign. He has not played any role in picking political appointees or developing any political strategy with the Biden White House or with any of his political campaigns.
New board seats raise conflict of interest concerns
Public Square, the company whose board Trump Jr joined last week, calls itself an “anti-woke” marketplace. “Woke” is a term that historically has meant a more open-minded and empathetic view of all populations, but the US right wing has attempted to redefine the term as an insult.
“Don’s passion for creating a ‘cancel-proof’ economy” was a driving factor, Public Square said in its news release. Neither Trump Jr nor Public Square responded to Al Jazeera’s request for comment to explain what that means.
Like other e-commerce platforms, Public Square faces regulation in Washington, including from agencies like the Federal Trade Commission and the Federal Communications Commission.
Experts are concerned that Trump Jr’s involvement could sway the White House to take actions that are in Public Square’s interest on key issues facing the e-commerce industry, such as net neutrality.
Stronger net neutrality laws could make it easier for smaller e-commerce players to compete with the likes of Amazon. However, Trump’s current pick to run the FCC, Brendan Carr has long been a critic of net neutrality.
“[A] Principle of ethics rules is that the public office cannot be used for personal gain, which includes the personal gain of your family. Nevertheless, a child of a president is free to engage in business activities like any other private citizen, but a yellow light flashes when they suddenly join organisations that could be directly affected by the work of the president,” said Kedric Payne, senior director at the Campaign Legal Center.
Trump Jr has also joined the board of Unusual Machines, a maker of drone components that is based in Florida and one that has voiced concern about supply chains being dominated by China.
On its website, the company says that conflicts like the one in Ukraine are creating significant changes in the manufacturing and supply chains for drones and a “shift toward American manufacturing will create significant demand for a non Chinese based supplier of drone components and represents an opportunity for us to rapidly grow”.
Its CEO, Allan Evans, told the Wall Street Journal that the decision to bring Trump Jr onto its board is not about political access, but more for his business network. Unusual Machines did not provide Al Jazeera with a comment.
President-elect Trump has promised to impose tariffs on the three biggest US trading partners, including stiff taxes for China.
‘Trading on the family name’
Ethics experts do not believe there are legal implications for Trump Jr’s role on the boards of these companies, but are concerned about the ethical implications.
“We’re always very concerned with the sort of trading on the family name stuff that happens in politics and the conflicts of interest that stem from that,” Dylan Hedtler-Gaudette, Director of Government Affairs for Project On Government Oversight, told Al Jazeera.
Donald Sherman, senior vice president and chief counsel at Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics, echoes Hedtler-Gaudette’s concerns.
“Federal law does not adequately cover conflicts of interests created by the financial entanglements of a president’s adult children, but they should proactively avoid financial arrangements that appear to arise from their ties to their parents’ elected office. Donald Trump repeatedly violated the Constitution’s emoluments clauses, so it’s no surprise that his son is accepting private sector benefits from companies that have a stake in his father’s official conduct as president,” Sherman told Al Jazeera.
But “watchdog groups will continue to monitor to see if there is any indication that the president uses his office in any way to benefit his children financially,” Payne added.
Hedtler-Gaudette also said that the moral inconsistency from Republicans who had an issue with Hunter Biden but not with Donald Trump Jr is troubling in his view, given his assessment that the Trump team’s willingness to bend the rules is a concern for democratic norms.
“It is a continuation of a longstanding problem. But I think it also has the potential to be worse because of the people involved here and how much they don’t really care about the norms and the sort of rules of the road around this kind of thing,” Hedtler-Gaudette added.
Al Jazeera reached out to Republicans who voiced outrage over the conflicts of interest facing Hunter Biden, asking them to respond to the conflicts of interest facing Trump Jr.
Some of the loudest republican senator critics of Hunter Biden were Ted Cruz from Texas, Rand Paul from Kentucky, Lindsey Graham from South Carolina, and Marsha Blackburn from Tennessee. None of them responded to Al Jazeera’s request for comment.
The GOP House Oversight Committee, which has long been accused of selectively targeting Democrats and liberal issues while ignoring alleged corruption by conservatives, has not addressed this issue. The committee spokesperson did not respond to Al Jazeera’s request for comment about Donald Trump Jr’s conflicts.
