On December 10, 2017, CEFC China Energy executive Patrick Ho appealed to the Chinese Communist Party from a New York City jail. During the call, court documents show, Ho asked Beijing for help in an upcoming bribery case, noting that China had helped him hire “the best lawyer.”
Three months earlier, CEFC China Energy hired Hunter Biden as Ho’s lawyer.
It is unclear if Ho was referring to the troubled first son, who signed a $1 million retainer with CEFC China Energy on Sept. 18, 2017. But Ho’s phone call, an FBI transcript of which was released in previously unreported court documents, adds another layer of mystery to the Biden family’s relationship with CEFC China Energy.
The company first approached Hunter Biden through Western intermediaries in 2015, when Joe Biden was vice president. The company struck a multimillion-dollar consulting agreement with Hunter Biden and his uncle Jim in August 2017. Lawmakers have called the Biden family’s work with CEFC a national security concern because of the conglomerate’s ties to Chinese military intelligence.
Hunter Biden’s legal work for Ho in particular has been a source of intrigue, in large part because Biden appears to have provided few legal services for Ho to warrant a seven-figure retainer. Biden signed on to represent Ho in mid-September 2017, around the same time he and Jim Biden met with Ho at his home in Hong Kong. A former Ho associate has told Congress that the Biden family obtained confidential information about federal investigations into CEFC China Energy through a high-level source at the FBI.