potential gun crimes he committed from 2014 through 2019. a gun charge is where the things went off the rails a bit, when the judge asked about the relationship, whether the two things were connected, whether the tax counts were connected to this diversion program under which hunter biten agrees to abide by any stipulation from the court. as part of that, this possession of a gun charge goes away. it is a felony, so it is a serious charge. hunter biden bought a firearm at a time he was not qualified to own one, because he was addicted to drugs. that was part of the issue today. you pointed out, part of the issue now is that the government says this is still an ongoing investigation, so there are certainly things that perhaps hunter biden could perhaps by charged with that are not covered by this investigation. potentially acting as a foreign agency for other
does not specify how far in excess, but in excess. the word willful means he did it on purpose. he knew he was supposed to pay taxes, he knew that he did not pay them. it was not an accident. that is a misdemeanor meaning the maximum penalty is a year but parties have agreed the appropriate sentence should be probation, which is absolutely normal for a misdemeanor. it is rare to see misdemeanor result in more than probation. second of all there s an agreement that hunter biden, he s going to be charged with possession of a firearm by an addicted person. a fairly really charged firearms law. if he abides by certain conditions, if he sts ean, if he does not get arrested again, thicaseill be dismissed without having to plea to it. it icalled pretria diversion. what happens next? doj, and hunter biden are going to go to federal court in delaware. biden will enter a guilty plea in front of a judge to the tax counts. you will say yes, i failed to pay my taxes, yes it was a crime and yes i m
and just to be very clear, we re already seeing criticism from donald trump and others that this is the biden justice department cutting a sweetheart deal with the president s son. this investigation was run by the trump-appointed u.s. attorney in delaware, who is treated like an independent counsel, no involvement from by the attorney general merrick garland or senior officials in the justice department other than career tax lawyers who have to be involved in any tax-related case. but that s the bottom line here. hunter biden agreeing to plead guilty to misdemeanors that should result in no jail time, ana. carol, this investigation has gone on for years since 2018. what is your reaction to how this ended? i don t have a particularly strong reaction to the way it ended. these tax counts, especially when they re sort of standing by themselves and they re not attached to something larger, a larger case, often do end up with this kind of relatively technical resolution. and that s p
be on his record, and that s a felony charge but he s not being charged with a felony, and there are two takeaways, he s admitting to crimes that are misdemeanors and there s no jail time. it s a significant legal victory by hunter biden and his lawyers. another way to look at it is president biden said my son did nothing wrong, and he s admitting he did something wrong and failed to pay his taxes intentionally, and those are crimes. to a former prosecutor, can you help break down this agreement? yes, so based on the filing that we saw today, it appears they reached a resolution in which the prosecution will charge hunter biden with two tax counts, and they are misdemeanors. for the separate gun issue, there will be a pretrial diversion which eventually says you will not be charged with a
so-calleds building permits that tracks construction in the future they also rose. now, the caveat, jose, is that it doesn t take a lot to file for a permit, so those numbers don t eventually transfer, big day for real estate, though. jose. dominic, i thank you. that wraps up jose diaz-balart reports. you can always reach me on twitter and instagram at j.d.balart andrea mitchell reports picks up right now. right now on andrea mitchell reports breaking news from capitol hill to the white house. president biden s son hunter will plead guilty to two tax counts as part of a plea deal with a u.s. attorney appointed by donald trump. a separate gun charge will likely be dropped as part of a pretrial diversion program. we ll have expert reaction and