Hunter Biden, son of US President Joe Biden, sent a ‘cease and desist’ letter to former president Donald Trump on Thursday, warning that continuing to target the troubled 53-year-old on social media could result in “even more legal trouble” for the Republican presidential hopeful.
Trump’s online comments – including his suggestions that one or both Bidens was responsible for the cocaine recently discovered in the White House – “could lead to [Hunter’s] or his family’s injury,” Abbe Lowell, a lawyer for the younger Biden, told ABC News on Friday.
Lowell cited previous incidents, including the January 6 Capitol riot, the assault on then House speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband in October, and the arrest of a heavily-armed man near the Obama’s home last month, as being inspired by past Trump comments and warned Trump's attorneys, "We are just one such social media message away from another incident.”
“You should make clear to Mr. Trump – if you have not done so already – that Mr. Trump’s words have caused harm in the past and threaten to do so again if he does not stop,” Lowell continued, urging the ex-president’s lawyers to impress upon their client “how his incitement can further hurt people and cause himself even more legal trouble.”
Trump recently skewered Hunter with a series of posts on his Truth Social platform, arguing the cocaine discovered in a cubby in the White House’s West Wing earlier this month belonged to the younger Biden, whose struggles with crack addiction are well-documented.
“THEY 100% KNOW WHO IT IS,” Trump wrote regarding the cocaine culprit on Monday, claiming, “If they don’t release information, it means they destroyed the tapes & the Cocaine was for use by Hunter, & probably Crooked Joe, in order to give this total disaster of a President a little life and energy!” In an earlier post, he asked if “anyone really believe[d] that the COCAINE found in the West Wing of the White House, very close to the Oval Office, [was] for the use of anyone other than Hunter & Joe Biden.”
Trump renewed his attacks after the younger Biden pleaded guilty last month to two misdemeanor tax charges following a years-long investigation, in a plea deal that is expected to keep him out of prison. The Republican 2024 frontrunner lamented that the prosecutor “gave out a traffic ticket instead of a death sentence.”
The former president’s own legal troubles continue to pile up, as a Georgia grand jury considers charging him over alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 election results. He has already been indicted both federally and by the state of New York and has pled not guilty to all charges.