White House Hired Criminal Art Dealer to Vet Ethics of Hunter Biden’s Art Sales

President Joe Biden’s son Hunter has set out to attempt yet another profession he has no experience in, as a high-priced artist. The White House cleverly hired an art dealer to “vet Hunter Biden’s art sales for ethical conflicts” to mask the overwhelmingly obvious fact that yes, it absolutely is a huge ethical conflict.

Lucky for the White House, their pick for moral clarity is exactly who they want on their side of blurred ethical lines. The gallery owner, Georges Bergès, was sentenced to three months in jail in 1998 for threatening to stab a man to death and in 2016 was accused of defrauding the daughter of a Norwegian shipping tycoon out of a $500,000 investment in his gallery. Someone needs to do the courtesy of telling the White House about a little thing called ‘Google.’

Bergès is apparently responsible for approving sales of Hunter’s art, which are set to be priced between $75,000 and $500,000. Oh, not to mention, sales will be open to foreign buyers, according to the White House.

The Washington Free Beacon reports:

Court records obtained by the Washington Free Beacon shed additional light on Bergès’s legal history, which was first reported by the New York Post in January. Bergès was accused in May 1998 of assaulting a man with a knife and making death threats, according to charging documents filed in Santa Cruz County. According to prosecutors, Bergès threatened the victim “with the specific intent that the statement be taken as a threat” and “was so unequivocal, unconditional, immediate and specific as to convey to the victim a gravity of purpose and an immediate prospect of execution.”

Bergès pleaded no contest to making terrorist threats, a misdemeanor charge. He was sentenced to 90 days in jail, required to submit to warrantless police searches, and barred from contacting the victim or possessing deadly weapons for 36 months, according to court records.
Ethics watchdogs, already critical of the Biden administration’s decision to outsource the vetting process to Biden’s art dealer, called for public transparency to ensure prospective buyers don’t use the process to try to purchase influence with the White House. Critics say the sales could attract lobbyists or foreign nationals who would be willing to buy the paintings for way over their value in order to curry favor with the White House. Bergès’s legal history serves as a reminder that Hunter Biden’s dealings have not always been on the up and up. Biden was tapped for a high-paying board position at the Ukrainian oil company Burisma and at a Chinese hedge fund while his father was vice president, arrangements that drew criticism during the elder Biden’s presidential campaign. He is also under federal investigation for his tax activities.
“Everything about Hunter’s art deal screams shady, and the new information about the organizer only solidifies what we have been saying: Hunter’s shenanigans threaten to derail the entire Biden agenda,” said Tom Anderson, director of the National Legal and Policy Center’s Government Integrity Project.

Executive director of the Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust, Kendra Arnold, said the Biden administration’s “complete lack of transparency regarding the sale of Hunter Biden’s art is deeply troubling.”

Nonetheless, White House Press Secretary assured reporters in July that “all interactions  regarding the selling of art and the setting of prices will be handled by a professional gallerist, adhering to the highest industry standards, and any offer out of the normal course would be rejected out of hand.”

She also said trusty criminal Bergès would “not share information about buyers or prospective buyers, including their identities, with Hunter Biden or the administration.”