Hunter Biden to speak about father at Democratic convention

Hunter Biden is set to speak at the Democratic National Convention Thursday before his father, former Vice President Joe Biden, formally accepts the party’s White House nomination.

In a list of speakers for the convention’s final day, Hunter Biden is scheduled to speak with his half-sister Ashley Biden before their father takes the stage. 

Hunter Biden has emerged as a top boogeyman for the GOP during the 2020 campaign over his business arrangements in China and Ukraine, with Republicans claiming that he profited off of his father’s perch as vice president. Both Bidens have denied they ever discussed the dealings while Joe Biden was in office.

President Trump’s reelection campaign rolled out an attack ad, part of a seven-figure digital advertising buy, against Hunter Biden Thursday overlaying remarks from news anchors discussing questions over his business transactions.

Hunter Biden has denied any wrongdoing and maintained he never leveraged his father’s position for personal gain, though the GOP has sought to cast his deals abroad as evidence of corruption by the former vice president.

Trump has been among the chief cheerleaders of the theory that there was wrongdoing by one or both of the Bidens, calling for China to investigate the younger Biden and pressuring the Ukrainian government to open up a probe of its own in a push to cast the Bidens as corrupt. Trump’s requests for Kyiv to open a probe ultimately led to his impeachment.

Biden’s acceptance speech Thursday night will close out a four-day convention that is based in Milwaukee but has gone largely digital during the coronavirus pandemic. Also scheduled to speak are Sens. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms.

The GOP convention to officially nominate Trump for a second term begins Monday.