FBI secretly recorded James Biden's dealmaking during unrelated bribery probe

The FBI secretly captured recordings of James Biden's business dealings while investigating an attorney in an unrelated bribery scheme, according to a new report that shows how President Joe Biden's brother has been benefitting from his family name for years.

James Biden nor his brother Joe Biden were ever charged or convicted in connection to the FBI's corruption probe of Mississippi trial attorney Richard "Dickie" Scruggs, but recordings reviewed by The Washington Post for an article Sunday reveal how the brothers' work has intersected. 

Scruggs paid James Biden's consulting firm $100,000 in 1998 for his advice on passing a bill that then-Delaware Sen. Biden opposed which would have forced tobacco companies to pay billions of dollars. 

"I probably wouldn’t have hired him if he wasn’t the senator’s brother," Scruggs said. The senator eventually supported the bill, but it ultimately failed to pass.

Both James Biden and his wife, Sara Biden, came under scrutiny when he was trying to create a consulting firm with Scruggs' associates as the FBI investigated the attorney and his colleagues over a plan to bribe a local judge with $40,000. Everyone involved in the scheme pleaded guilty by mid-2008, weeks before Biden received the vice presidential nomination. 

The FBI also secretly captured conversations with James Biden at the time, which brings up even more questions about his business dealings as House Republicans look into his dealings as well as those of first son Hunter Biden. 

"Long before Biden’s son Hunter became known for benefiting from the family name, James Biden also undertook a number of business ventures that created headaches for his brother," the Post states. "At one point in the 1970s, when James Biden faced significant debt from a nightclub business, Joe Biden said he shouldn’t be tarred by his brother’s problems, saying, 'Don’t bring my name into it,' according to the Dallas Morning News." 

In another example, when Joe Biden first ran for Senate in 1972, James Biden asked a union official for money, who agreed to give $5,000 on the condition he could meet the Democratic candidate. Joe Biden believed the official wanted a promise for a vote in exchange for the donation, and he rejected the check, but James Biden took it instead. 

The House passed an impeachment inquiry resolution against Biden earlier this month as they investigate the first family's business dealings. The House already issued subpoenas last month of both James Biden and Hunter Biden.

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