Biden brother testifies as key witness’s Russia links cloud impeachment push

Joe Biden’s younger brother, James Biden, testified to the House oversight and judiciary committees on Wednesday, a closed-door session held even as Republican attempts to impeach the president for alleged corruption teetered on the edge of collapse.

In a combative opening statement, released to the press, James Biden denied that his brother had ever been involved in his financial affairs and called anyone alleging otherwise “mistaken, ill-informed or flat-out lying”.

Hunter Biden, the president’s son whose troubled personal life, legal jeopardy and complex business affairs provide the chief fuel for Republican allegations, is due to be interviewed in private next week.

All the while, Washington will continue to digest and debate the news that a former FBI informant charged with making up a multimillion-dollar bribery scheme involving the Bidens and Burisma, a Ukrainian energy company, had contacts with officials affiliated with Russian intelligence.

Prosecutors revealed the alleged contact on Tuesday, as they urged a judge to keep Alexander Smirnov in custody before trial.

Smirnov is charged with falsely reporting to the FBI in June 2020 that executives associated with Burisma paid Hunter Biden and Joe Biden $5m each in 2015 or 2016, when Joe Biden was vice-president to Barack Obama.

Donald Trump’s first impeachment was fueled by his search for dirt on the Bidens related to Ukraine. Smirnov’s claim has been central to Republican attempts to impeach Biden in return, and was therefore eagerly promoted by senior Republicans and their rightwing media allies, particularly on Fox News.

Smirnov was taken into custody at a facility in rural Pahrump, Nevada, west of Las Vegas, last week. Prosecutors said that before his arrest, Smirnov