Joe Biden’s younger brother told potential business partners that the former vice president would help their firm land business with court systems and would incorporate their health care model into his 2020 presidential campaign, according to new allegations made in a court filing in Tennessee.
The allegations are consistent with others made over the years that relatives of Biden have sought to enrich themselves off of his public service. But they go further, representing the first explicit claims that James Biden offered to have the former vice president use his clout to further private business interests.
The allegations come in sworn declarations made by executives at firms suing Biden’s brother that were filed in federal court on Friday. They do not allege any wrongdoing by Joe Biden or indicate that the former vice president had knowledge of his brother’s alleged promises.
Neither George Mesires, a lawyer for James Biden, nor Andrew Bates, a spokesman for the Biden campaign, immediately responded to a request for comment on the new allegations.
The firms, Azzam Medical Services and Diverse Medical Management, provide rural health care solutions. They sued James Biden and his business partners in June, claiming that, beginning in 2017, the group offered disingenuously to partner with the firms as part of a fraudulent scheme to bankrupt them and steal their business models.
In the Friday filing, three executives at the firms allege new details about their interactions with James Biden.
According to one of the declarations, by Diverse Medical Management’s CEO Michael Frey, James Biden suggested he would enlist his older brother’s help in landing the firm contracts for court-ordered outpatient care.
Frey describes meeting James Biden in January 2018 at a hospital in Pineville, Kentucky, where Frey was asked to make a presentation about his firm’s operating model.
“During my presentation regarding intensive outpatient treatment, James Biden interrupted me to say, ‘My brother needs to have you in every court system in America,’” Frey alleges, adding, “I left the meeting very excited and optimistic about the future of DMM [Diverse Medical Management].”
According to another declaration, by Mohannad Azzam, in the lead-up to Biden’s presidential campaign launch, James Biden promised in a phone call “that the DMM psychiatric care model would be used by Joe Biden as part of his campaign.”
Azzam alleges that in another phone call last fall, “James Biden mentioned that his brother’s connections to labor unions and the Department of Veterans Affairs would help DMM expand its model nationwide.”
Similarly, in a third declaration, Mitchell Cohen, Diverse Medical Management’s former general counsel, alleges that at a dinner outside of Philadelphia around early September 2018, James Biden said that his brother’s connections at the Department of Veterans Affairs could help the firm land VA contracts.
Cohen also alleged that James Biden “stated that he could facilitate contracts between DMM and first responders based on the relationships that his brother had with certain labor unions.”
More Biden Family fun.
Let’s keep the “scandal free” record of the Obama/Biden administration going! What’s a little influence peddling between family? Hillary made millions peddling her influence internationally; it’s only fair the Biden’s get the same opportunities.