On Monday in Delaware, one of two trials will begin in which President Biden’s son will defend himself during a presidential election year.
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Hunter Biden with his wife, Melissa Cohen, and son, Beau, on Friday. A year ago, he seemed unlikely to face trial on the gun charges he will face starting Monday.
Hunter Biden will go on trial on gun charges on Monday in Delaware within walking distance of his father’s campaign headquarters in Wilmington, less than a week after former President Donald J. Trump’s felony conviction in New York.
A year ago, the younger Mr. Biden seemed unlikely to face trial on the weapons charges he was facing over a firearms application that prosecutors say was falsified, or from more serious charges of failing to pay taxes from overseas business activities at a time when he was using drugs and alcohol heavily and spending lavishly.
But a plea deal, which offered him some immunity from prosecution and did not include prison time, imploded in July. The judge in the case punched holes in the agreement, to the delight of Mr. Trump’s allies in Congress who tried to scuttle that deal and have portrayed Hunter Biden’s legal problems as equivalent to those of their party’s 2024 presidential candidate in an effort to impeach President Biden.
Still, it is the son — not the father — who will be on trial twice during an election year. On Monday, he is set to report to the fourth-floor courtroom of Judge Maryellen Noreika when jury selection begins at 9 a.m. in a trial expected to last three to five days. The other, set to begin in September, involves a series of tax offenses related to his failure to file returns for a number of years.
Last September, a federal grand jury charged Mr. Biden with three felonies: lying to a federally licensed gun dealer, making a false claim on the federal firearms application used to screen applicants and possessing an illegally obtained gun for 11 days, from Oct. 12 to Oct. 23, 2018.
“Hunter Biden possessed a firearm while knowing he was an unlawful user of or addicted to any stimulant, narcotic drug or any other controlled substance, in violation of federal law,” prosecutors said.
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