During the 118th Congress, as House Republicans were investigating the Biden crime family, Congress heard from many of then First Son Hunter Biden's previous associates ,including Devon Archer and Jason Galanis. These two men provided invaluable insight. They also said they were targeted for their willingness to come forward. Now, President Donald Trump has granted clemency to both men.
Most recently, Trump granted clemency to Galanis last Friday, commuting his entire sentence. The New York Times reported on the commutation earlier on Monday.
As we covered at the time in February of last year, the House Oversight Committee heard jailhouse testimony from Galanis, who was clear that Hunter's value "was his family name and his access to" then Vice President Joe Biden. Galanis also appeared remotely to testify before the Committee in March of last year.
According to The New York Times:
Jason Galanis was sentenced in 2020 to 189 months in prison and ordered to pay nearly $162 million in forfeiture and restitution after pleading guilty to his role in two securities fraud schemes. One of the schemes, which defrauded investors and a Native American tribal entity of tens of millions of dollars, involved a company for which Mr. Biden was listed as the vice chairman, according to documents introduced at trial.
Galanis testified that he believes he was "the victim of a pattern of retribution by the Department of Justice" under the Biden-Harris administration and also alleged sexual assault from a prison guard:
The testimony took a dark turn when Galanis mentioned how he was serving time after pleading guilty to securities fraud. "Our companies were entrusted with $11 billion of union members’ pension fund money whose trust I betrayed," he shared in his testimony. He's so far served eight years of a 14-year sentence.
What Galanis detailed was not only a prosecutorial strategy he says he believes was meant to protect the Bidens, but allegations of sexual assault he says he experienced from a guard at the Federal Prison Camp at Pensacola.
"Especially because I was not asking for any reduction in the charges or sentence, my attorney at the time told me the rejection was highly irregular," Galanis said about such a development. "As I reviewed the facts, I realized the prosecutors in the SDNY had gone lightly on Devon Archer and had not indicted Hunter Biden at all, despite then-available documentation that we were partners, were involved in the decision making that involved illegal self-dealing, and all of us had financially benefited from these schemes."
Archer was convicted and sought appeals, but is still facing a prison sentence of one-year and one-day, Fox News mentioned.
"I believe the SDNY’s prosecution strategy was intended to protect Hunter Biden, and ultimately Vice President Biden," Galanis testified.
Due to his "concerns regarding this unequal treatment," Galanis says he submitted a Petition for Commutation with the DOJ in December 2020. "I filed this request after the 2020 election, and I knew if this was not granted, I could face the wrath of the incoming Biden Administration, including the Department of Justice," he noted.
Although Galanis says that his CARES Act home confinement request was approved on June 9, 2023, that approval was reversed on June 13, the day after the Oversight Committee announced they were issuing a subpoena to Archer.
Once more, the SDNY came up in Galanis' testimony. "I understand from a former high-ranking Bureau of Prison official that SDNY prosecutors aggressively weighed in with the Bureau of Prisons staff to oppose my release," Galanis shared. "As a result of this DOJ intervention, I was denied home confinement."
While Galanis said he "formally appealed the reversal," the reasons for the denial kept changing. "I was treated differently," Galanis testified, compared to other prisoners going through the process.
Galanis had sought home confinement as a form of protection against the sexual assault he alleged in his testimony he experienced from "a member of the prison staff at FPC Pensacola" starting in January 2023. Galanis involved a chaplain and warden, and after the warden opened an investigation and after evaluations and debriefings, he was "immediately escorted to a vehicle and driven by senior staff several hours to FPC Montgomery."
"I believe that based on the events I have described, much of which is memorialized in writing, I have been the victim of a pattern of retribution by the Department of Justice in order to prevent my home confinement, which would have allowed full and free access to Congressional investigators," Galanis said towards the end of his testimony.
Speaking of Archer, Trump has issued him a pardon. That news was first covered by Miranda Devine, a columnist for the New York Post last week.
As Devine wrote:
The president promised Archer the pardon when they met at the NCAA wrestling championships in Philadelphia Saturday night, an encounter arranged by another former Hunter Biden associate-turned-whistleblower, Tony Bobulinski.
“He’s getting a full pardon,” Trump told me Sunday. “He was screwed by the Bidens. They destroyed him like they tried to destroy a lot of people.
“A full pardon,” Trump repeated, describing Archer as an “anti-Biden person” because of his pivotal role in exposing Biden corruption.
...
The presidential clemency will end a decade-long ordeal for Archer, who was facing jail time for securities fraud over a bad deal he was involved in with Hunter Biden in 2015.
Devine also touched upon Archer's sentencing and how he too was targeted, in a header titled 'Politically Exposed':
“I want to extend my deepest thanks to President Trump,” Archer said Sunday. “I am grateful to the president for recognizing that I was the victim of a convoluted lawfare effort intended to destroy and silence me.
“Like so many people, my life was devastated by the Biden family’s selfish disregard for the truth and for the peace of mind and happiness of others. The Bidens talk about justice, but they don’t mean it,” he said. “I am grateful that the American people are now well aware of this reality.”
Hunter was the original target of the Southern District of New York investigation that ensnared Archer. As the son of Joe Biden, the vice president at the time, Hunter was deemed a “politically exposed person” in suspicious activity reports filed by a Morgan Stanley risk assessor.
Hunter was paid $200,000 as vice chairman of a financial services company involved in a $60 million tribal bonds fraud, while Archer says he lost millions when the firm collapsed. Yet, in the end, Hunter escaped unscathed, without charges or even having to testify, while Archer was convicted of fraud in 2018.
Archer has been on a legal roller coaster ever since, a victim of what he calls the “Obama-Biden legal apparatus” that protected Hunter.
District Judge Ronnie Abrams threw out Archer’s jury conviction in 2018, declaring his innocence and citing insufficient evidence that he knew about or benefited from the fraud.
But, two years later, Archer’s conviction was reinstated on appeal, and in 2022 he was sentenced to a year in prison and ordered to pay almost $60 million in fines and restitution, only to have the sentence overturned on a technicality and a resentencing scheduled for later this year.
Townhall was covering House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer's (R-KY) interest in Archer extensively in 2023. He was subpoened by Comer in June of that year. Archer testified before the Committee on July 31 of that year, during which he confirmed that then Vice President Biden was "the brand." The transcript of such testimony was released just days later, on August 3.
As Devine mentioned, and as we also covered at the time, it was right around the time he testified before the Committee that the Department of Justice (DOJ) sent a letter asking for a date on when Archer was supposed to start his prison sentence. It was a letter that the DOJ was forced to clarify.
House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) also referenced Archer's testimony when speaking to Fox News' "Fox & Friends" in December of that year when an inquiry into impeaching then President Biden was formalized by the House.
Every single day, here at Townhall, we will stand up and FIGHT, FIGHT, FIGHT against the radical left and deliver the conservative reporting our readers deserve.
Help us continue to the truth about the Trump administration and its major wins. Join Townhall VIP and use promo code FIGHT to get 60% off your membership.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member