Joe Biden used his influence to make money for his family and tried to hide it, claimed Republicans in the first hearing of their impeachment inquiry.
James Comer, the Oversight Committee chairman, said there was “a mountain of evidence” showing he “abused his public office for his family’s financial gain”.
“This is a tale as old as time,” added another Republican, Jim Jordan.
“Politician takes action that makes money for his family and then he tries to conceal it.”
Despite the claims, nothing has proven that Mr Biden abused his position during his eight years as vice president.
The White House has said the impeachment investigation is baseless and politically motivated ahead of next year’s likely election showdown with Donald Trump.
A forensic accountant, a former Justice Department official and two law professors appeared at Thursday’s session – but nobody with direct knowledge of the allegations.
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Professor Jonathan Turley, an impeachment expert called by the Republicans, said the threshold for an inquiry had been passed but there was not enough to impeach.
“I do not believe that the current evidence would support articles of impeachment,” Professor Turley said.
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Forensic accountant Bruce Dubinsky backed up that assessment.
Another law professor and Democrat witness, Michael Gerhardt, said the evidence wasn’t even sufficient for an inquiry.
“A fishing expedition is not a legitimate purpose,” he told the hearing.
Republicans claim Mr Biden and his family profited from policies he pursued between 2009 to 2017 and that son Hunter took advantage of his father’s name.
“Hunter Biden cashed in by arranging access to Joe Biden, the family brand,” Mr Comer told the hearing.
Central to the probe are allegations Joe Biden pressured Ukraine to fire a top prosecutor to stop an investigation into Burisma, an energy firm his son was on the board of.
However, multiple foreign and US officials have said he was only pursuing official policy to fight corruption in pre-war Ukraine.
It is also claimed the Justice Department interfered with a tax investigation into Hunter Biden – who is set to plead not guilty to a gun chargenext month and has struggled with drugs in the past.
Ahead of the hearing, Republicans released documents detailing money transfers from a Chinese businessman to Hunter Biden in 2019 – in which he put his father’s address on the form.
Republicans claimed it showed a definite link to the president.
A lawyer for Hunter Biden said the money was a loan and that he had put down his father’s address because it was on his driving licence and his only permanent residence at the time.
“Once again Rep Comer peddles lies to support a premise – some wrongdoing by Hunter Biden or his family – that evaporates in thin air the moment facts come out,” said lawyer Abbe Lowell.
‘No smoking gun’
“If Republicans had a smoking gun or even a dripping water pistol they would be presenting it today. But they’ve got nothing,” said Jamie Raskin, the hearing’s top Democrat.
It’s unclear if Republicans, who have a slim majority in the House of Representatives, would have enough votes at the end of the inquiry to move forward with the impeachment process.
Political theatre – but there’s a hole in the script
Impeachment isn’t what it used to be.
Once a political nuclear weapon deployed on matters of grave consequence, it’s now the water pistol they can’t put down.
It’s the new politics on Capitol Hill, and its pursuit of Joe Biden paints the picture of a then vice-president abusing the powers of office – of using his position and influence to support his son’s business ventures in an effort to fill the family coffers.
As allegations, they reek of corruption. They would reek rather more if there was hard evidence behind them.
But in this act of political theatre, that’s the hole in the script.
There has been no paper trail produced, no recording, no first-hand eyewitness testimony that makes the link between dodgy business dealings and active participation by Joe Biden.
It is a shaky platform on which to build a case for impeachment. But, of course, this process of impeachment is about more than impeachment itself. It’s politics.
This hearing, and those to follow, lend traction to discussion around Biden and the whiff of corruption.
To some degree, it orientates the public gaze away from the legal travails of Donald Trump – creates an equivalence, false or not, between his behaviour and that of Joe Biden.
That will suit Republicans in the run-up to November 2024 – it doesn’t take a cynic to see a campaign strategy.
Even if the vote did go their way, it’s extremely unlikely the Senate – where Democrats hold a majority – would vote to remove Mr Biden from power.
Donald Trump was impeached twice during his presidency – one of them for allegedly allegedly pressuring Ukraine to investigate Biden ahead of the 2020 election.
He was acquitted both times by the Senate.
The impeachment hearing comes as House Republicans face off against Democrats over government funding for the fiscal year starting on 1 October.
Large parts of the government will shut down if they cannot agree.
Democrat Jamie Raskin scolded the panel: “We’re 62 hours away from shutting down the government of the United States of America and Republicans are launching an impeachment drive, based on a long debunked and discredited lie.”
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Hear Trump and his lawyer discuss hush money
The court also heard a recording of a conversation between Mr Trump and Mr Cohen over hush money said to have been paid to another woman, former Playboy model Karen McDougal, who he also allegedly had an affair with.
Mr Cohen suggests in the recording setting up another company to repay David Pecker – who said he provided the $150,000 to cover up the story.
The former National Enquirer boss previously testified he bought the story to keep it hidden and eventually decided against seeking reimbursement.
Later in the recording, Mr Trump can be heard suggesting the $150,000 might be better off being paid in cash.
Mr Cohen told the court this was to “avoid any type of paper transaction”.
The 57-year-old – who once said he would take a bullet for Mr Trump – worked for him for nearly a decade.
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He pleaded guilty to violating campaign finance law in 2018 over the Stormy Daniels payment and was jailed, but at the time prosecutors did not bring charges against Mr Trump.
Mr Cohen’s credibility is in the sights of defence lawyers as he has previously admitted lying under oath.
Mr Trump – who will take on Joe Biden in his bid to become president again in November – is unlikely to face a custodial sentence if found guilty.
His other cases are potentially more damaging but mired in delays.
They concern allegations of keeping stacks of secret documents after leaving office and trying to overturn his 2020 election defeat. He denies the claims.
A livestream portal between Dublin and New York was temporarily shut down after “inappropriate behaviour” in the Irish capital.
Thousands of people have visited the two-way portal, which allows people on either side to see and interact with each other.
And while there have been a number of wholesome moments – including Irish dancing and even a proposal – a handful of people have behaved “inappropriately”, Dublin City Council has said.
Videos on social media have shown people on the Irish side flashing body parts, and displaying images of 9/11 and swear words on phone screens.
A woman was also escorted away by police after being seen grinding against the portal.
In a statement issued on Monday evening, a spokesperson for Dublin City Council said “technical solutions” to address this are being implemented in the next 24 hours.
“We will continue to monitor the situation over the coming days with our partners in New York to ensure that Portals continue to deliver a positive experience for both cities and the world,” they said.
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“The team at portals.org and partners are still working on improving the software for better stability and to prepare for Portals to expand to more locations on Earth.
“Those works are being done mostly at night and during those hours, the livestream might be paused.”
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Dublin City Council noted there has been an increase in footfall since the Portal was unveiled in north Dublin, facing O’Connell Street. The New York portal is at the busy Manhattan junction of Broadway, Fifth Avenue and 23rd Street.
“The overwhelming majority of interactions are positive,” the spokesperson added. “We have seen families and friends unite, dancing moves being shared as well as new friendships being made. There was even a successful marriage proposal.
“The Portal offers a window to other cities and is connecting people and cultures in a unique manner – what we are seeing between Dublin and NY is reflective of a wider narrative of cultural behaviour.”
The Portals Organisation said: “We do not intend to suggest people to interact with Portals in any particular way – our goal is to open a window between far away places and cultures that allows people to interact freely with one another.
“We encourage people to be respectful and from our position as observers, we see that the absolute majority of experiences is on the bright side.”
In an earlier statement, they confirmed the livestream had been paused so they could “update the software used on the Portal”.
The new version of the ChatGPT AI chatbot has been unveiled and offers near-instant results across text, vision and audio, according to its maker.
OpenAI said it was much better at understanding visuals and sounds than previous versions.
It offers the prospect of real-time ‘conversations’ with the chatbot, including the ability to interrupt its answers.
The firm says it “accepts as input any combination of text, audio, and image and generates any combination of text, audio, and image outputs”.
GPT-4o is to be rolled out over the next few weeks amid a battle by tech firms to develop ever-more advanced artificial intelligence tools.
Monday’s announcement showed tasks such as real-time language translation; using its vision capability to solve a maths question on a piece of paper, and to guide a blind person around London.
GPT-4o can respond to audio in as little as 232 milliseconds, with an average of 320 milliseconds, which the company says is similar to human response time.
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To try to ease concerns over bias, fairness and misinformation, the Microsoft-backed company says the new version has undergone extensive testing by 70 external experts.
It comes after Google earlier this year had a major PR blunder over images generated by its Gemini AI system.
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GPT-4o model will be free, but premium ‘Plus’ users get a greater capacity limit for messages.
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