ABC News is reporting today that all sales of Hunter Biden’s artwork will be handled through an art gallery that will set prices independently and keep the identities of buyers confidential, including from the president and administration officials. Yeah, right.
The article reports:
White House officials were involved in creating the arrangement, according to the source, as a way to avoid any suggestion of preferential treatment or conflict of interest.
According to the Washington Post, which first reported the story, Berges has said Hunter Biden’s artwork could be priced anywhere from $75,000 to $500,000.
But ethics experts are raising concerns about the agreement.
“This arrangement is problematic. The best disinfectant, in this case, would have been to have a publicly open process. The public could see who the purchasers are, and then it would be incumbent upon the Bidens to bear the burden of saying why it isn’t a conflict,” said Meredith McGehee, executive director of Issue One, a nonprofit dedicated to reducing the influence of money in politics.
“The White House went the absolute opposite way they should have gone. The only people, in the end, who won’t know who the buyers are is the public. By going the shadow direction, this raises more questions than answers,” she said.
Based on the past history of Hunter Biden and other members of the Biden family, could we have expected anything less? This is almost as good as the finances of the Clinton Foundation. I am sure that it was simply an incredible coincidence that when Hillary Clinton no longer had power and influence in Washington, the donations to the Clinton Foundation dried up. Likewise, I suspect that the demand for Hunter Biden’s artwork will shrink drastically when Joe Biden is no longer President.