Weekly White House Report Card: ‘Stink of corruption’ over Biden

This week’s White House Report Card finds President Joe Biden unable to shake free from his classified documents scandal and ties to the questionable practices of first son Hunter Biden.

Questions grew during the week about the chain of command of state secrets he had from the Obama days, the near $1 million he was paid by his China-backed Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement of the University of Pennsylvania, and reports Hunter Biden paid thousands of dollars to live in Biden’s Wilmington, Delaware, home.

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Furthermore, the economy saw new tech job layoffs, the debt ceiling was hit, and the number of illegal immigrants crossing the border hit an all-time high under Joe Biden.

Conservative grader Jed Babbin focused on the scandals, graded a “D,” and said there is a “stink of corruption” hanging over the president.

Democratic pollster John Zogby, grading a “B-,” cited problems with the economy and widely swinging approval polls, but he also noted that there were “no catastrophes this week.”

Jed Babbin
Grade D

The best thing that can be said for Biden’s week is that it was a little better than the previous week. The scandals involving classified documents kept in his Delaware home and his Washington “think tank,” the rent son Hunter Biden reportedly paid him, and the $900,000 Joe Biden was paid for his college professorship all stink of corruption.

The FBI has, bizarrely, not taken charge of the search for classified documents around Biden’s home and Washington office. Instead, and contrary to law enforcement practice, the FBI has left Biden’s lawyers in charge. Biden said he has “no regrets” about the secret and top-secret documents found (illegally) in his possession. The contrast between the FBI’s raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate and the handling of the Biden scandal is quite stark.

Hunter Biden reportedly paid his father about $49,000 a month in rent to live in his father’s Delaware house for about a year. Did that include some of the money Hunter was paid by Burisma, the Ukrainian oil and gas company that hired him for its board despite his comprehensive lack of qualifications? Joe Biden’s “think tank” — it’s hard to use Biden’s name and “think” in one sentence — was apparently supported by more than $70 million in donations from Chinese banks and companies from 2013 to 2019.

While the Chinese money keeps rattling around, the United States, as a direct result of Biden’s reckless overspending, reached its legal borrowing limit of over $31 trillion on Thursday. That is about 120% of the U.S. gross domestic product. When a nation’s borrowing exceeds its GDP, it’s headed for a recession. The U.S. debt to GDP ratio was 76% in 2018. Now Biden wants another debt ceiling raise, and the House Republicans want spending cuts. They’ll back down rather than risk a default. Biden won’t back down because he wants to borrow and spend till eternity.

John Zogby
Grade B-

This week saw Biden’s polling numbers all over the place — not unlike classified documents found in his possession.

His approval ratings ranged from lows of 38%-40% to highs of 45%-47%.

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There are early warnings of the economy slowing down but no catastrophes this week.

And just few mentions of those pesky documents in the past 48 hours. Unlike his predecessor, the president announced he is following the advice of counsel on the document issue and then said that there is “no there there.”

Jed Babbin is a Washington Examiner contributor and former deputy undersecretary of defense in the administration of former President George H.W. Bush. Follow him on Twitter @jedbabbin

John Zogby is the founder of the Zogby Survey and senior partner at John Zogby Strategies. His weekly podcast with son and managing partner Jeremy Zogby can be heard here. Follow him on Twitter @ZogbyStrategies