Reports claiming that the sons of US President Joe Biden, Senator Mitt Romney, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the special presidential envoy for climate change John Kerry “are all on the board of directors of energy companies doing business in Ukraine”, marked by Facebook in its efforts to combat misinformation online. The claim is false, although Biden’s son Hunter previously held such a position.
Examples of postings that make this claim can be found here, here and here.
HUNTER COMMAND
During the 2020 campaign for the White House, Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, became a focal point for attacks by former President Donald Trump and his Republican allies, which questioned potential conflicts of interest from Hunter’s position on the Ukrainian council. energy company Burisma, when he was father vice president of Democratic President Barack Obama (here).
As Reuters reported in October 2019, interviews with more than a dozen people, including executives and former prosecutors in Ukraine, paint a picture of Hunter Biden as director advising on legal issues, corporate finance and strategy during his five-year term year on the board, which ended in April 2019 (here).
They also said that his presence on the board does not protect the company from criminal investigations instituted by Ukrainian authorities against its owner, Mykola Zlochevsky. The allegations relate to tax violations, money laundering and licenses given to Burisma during the period when Zlochevsky was a minister.
In June 2020, an audit of thousands of old case files by Ukrainian prosecutors found no evidence of misconduct by Hunter Biden (here).
On December 8, 2020, Hunter Biden announced that the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Delaware was investigating his tax affairs (here).
NANCY PELOSI SE SEUN
According to his LinkedIn page (here), Paul Pelosi, Jr., the only son of house speaker Nancy Pelosi, is currently a manager at phytopharmaceutical company ST Biosciences (www.stbiosciences.com/), a board member of San Francisco. The Sister City Committee of Shanghai (here) and a CEO for Business Development at the Corporate Governance Initiative (here).
The allegation that Paul Pelosi was on the board of directors for an energy company doing business in Ukraine may stem from his time on the board of Viscoil, an American energy company in Southern California.
As explained here in 2019 by PolitiFact, Viscoil, which focused on US affairs, has disbanded and reformed under a new name in Singapore, according to spokesman Drew Hammill. Hammill told PolitiFact that Pelosi was not involved with the new entity.
Reuters could not reach Hammill for comment on the recent recycling of these claims.
In addition to PolitiFact, FactCheck.org (here), Snopes (here) and USA Today (here) all consider Paul Pelosi’s allegations of collusion with a Ukrainian gas company to be false.
JOHN KERRY’S STEPSONS
Former Secretary of State and current Special Envoy for Climate Change John Kerry has two daughters, Alexandra and Vanessa Kerry (here), and three step-sons, Henry John Heinz IV, Christopher Drake Heinz and Andre Heinz (here).
As reported by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Henry John Heinz IV “maintained the lowest public profile of the three brothers over the years,” and he was a blacksmith in Bucks County, Pennsylvania (here).
Christopher Heinz currently serves on the board of directors of the Heinz Endowment (here). According to the Center for a New American Security, a thin bank in Washington, DC where he is on the board of advisers, he was previously senior vice president at PNC Bank and ‘the leader of its external Fintech investment program and strategy development ‘(here).
Andre Heinz is an environmentalist (here) and the current chairman of Heinz Endowments (here), and co-founder of the Sustainable Technologies Fund, a cleantech company in Sweden (evident.com/team/andre-heinz).
Allegations that a son of John Kerry is involved with a Ukrainian energy company probably originated in Christopher Heinz’s former business partnership with Hunter Biden. As outlined here by Reuters, Christopher Heinz joined Hunter Biden and Devon Archer, one of his classmates at Yale University, in 2009 to found financial services firm Rosemont Seneca Partners.
In 2012, Hunter Biden and Archer spoke with Chinese private investor Jonathan Li about the merger of a fund that would invest Chinese capital – and possibly capital from other countries – outside China, the New Yorker magazine reported in a profile of Hunter Biden in July 2019 (here).
Li, Archer and others agreed in 2013 to set up the fund, called BHR Partners, and Hunter Biden joined as an unpaid board member, the New Yorker said.
According to an archived version of BHR’s website from 2014, BHR was founded in 2013 by two Chinese asset managers along with Rosemont Seneca Partners and Thornton Group LLC.
A spokesman for Christopher Heinz told The Hill in March 2018 that Heinz had ‘no operating role’ in Rosemont Seneca, and that he had no involvement in any of the company’s business in China (here).
Calling ‘John Kerry’s son’, social reports are likely to bring Hunter Biden’s business dealings in Ukraine with its founding of BHR Partners, a fund linked to an investment firm that Heinz co-founded but is no longer part of. .
As reported here by the Washington Post in September 2019, Archer and Biden’s decision to join Burisma’s board in 2014 ‘expressed serious concern’ for Christopher Heinz, ‘who told Archer that he had a bad idea was to join Burisma ‘due to’ reports of corruption ‘in Ukraine, geopolitical risks and general questions about incidence. ‘
Chris Bastardi, a spokesman for Heinz, told the Post that Heinz Mr. Archer strongly warned that the work with Burisma was unacceptable, and that the move was an important catalyst for Mr. Heinz who described his business relationship with Mr. Archer and Mr. . Biden. ”
Reuters received no response to his request for comment from Kerry’s communications team.
MY ROMNEY SE SONS
Republican Senator Mitt Romney has five sons: Tagg, Matt, Josh, Ben and Craig Romney (here).
Tagg is the co-founder of Solamere Capital, a private equity investment firm in Boston where he serves as a managing partner (here). Matt is a managing director at a real estate firm in Salt Lake City called Sundance Bay (here). Josh is the president and founder of the Romney Group, a real estate investment firm in Salt Lake City (here, here). Ben is a radiologist in Murray, Utah (here). Craig is the director of asset management for Sundance Bay (here).
Reuters could not find an explanation for posts linking one of Romney’s sons to an energy company doing business in Ukraine.
When Arielle Mueller, Senator Romney’s press secretary, was reached for comment, he told Reuters in an email: “We do not comment on fake news of random internet trolls.”
VERDICT
Partly false. Although Hunter Biden previously sat on the board of the Ukrainian energy company Burisma, he no longer does so. The sons / step-sons of Nancy Pelosi, John Kerry and Mitt Romney are not and have not been board members of energy companies doing business in Ukraine.
This article was produced by the Reuters Fact Check team. Read more about our work to actually check social media posts.