Gun Owners, Relatives of Addicts: Who’s on the Jury in Hunter Biden’s Gun Trial
A jury of six men and six women were impaneled in Hunter Biden’s trial on federal gun charges on Monday, just hours after jury selection in the high-profile case kicked off in a Delaware courtroom.
The jurors were sworn in at 4:20 p.m., according to NBC News. A further four women were chosen as alternate jurors. The majority of the panel are Black, CNN reported.
After court was adjourned for the day, Hunter left the federal courthouse alongside wife Melissa Cohen Biden.
Opening statements in the case were set to begin on Tuesday morning, with the government’s first witness being an FBI agent who worked on the investigation.
Hunter, the first child of a sitting president to face a felony trial, is fighting three charges related to lying on a federal gun form. He is accused of lying to a licensed firearms dealer and making a false claim on a federal gun purchase form by saying he was not an unlawful user of a controlled substance. He is also alleged to have kept the gun illegally for 11 days.
If convicted, he could theoretically face a sentence of up to 25 years in prison, according to the DOJ, though the department notes that actual sentences are typically more lenient than possible maximum sentences.
Jury selection had proceeded at a clip earlier on Monday, with 47 potential jurors selected for the jury pool by late afternoon.
At least two prospective jurors were dismissed after mentioning they had been friendly with Hunter’s elder brother, the late Beau Biden.
“Beau and I played a squash tournament together,” one told the court, NBC News reported. Another, a woman, explained that Wilmington was “a small place,” according to the network.
“Beau was a friend of the family,” she added. “We miss him.”
Some of the jurors selected for the final panel said they were gun owners or had relatives who owned guns. One, a middle-aged Black man, told the court that he believed “the Second Amendment is very important,” according to NBC News.
Also at play will be the jurors’ views on substance abuse, with the case potentially hinging on the definition of “addiction” and whether Hunter had actively been using drugs on specific days in 2018.
Several of the selected jurors had told the court that they’d had a loved one struggle with substance abuse, according to ABC News. Juror No. 11 said her “childhood best friend” had died of a drug overdose, while Juror No. 12 explained that his older brother, with whom he is no longer close, has been to rehab multiple times for PCP and heroin use. Another, Juror No. 8, has a brother who was arrested for drug possession.
At least part of the proceedings on Monday were attended by Hunter’s family members, including his wife Melissa Cohen, sister Ashley Biden, and stepmother, first lady Jill Biden, who was celebrating her 73rd birthday Monday.
“Happy birthday,” Hunter said as he greeted Jill in the courtroom, according to The Washington Post, adding: “I got you a special event.” They both reportedly laughed at the joke.
Hunter’s father, President Joe Biden, was not expected to attend the proceedings, though he did release a statement about his “boundless love for my son, confidence in him, and respect for his strength.”
“I am the president, but I am also a Dad,” he said. “Jill and I love our son, and we are so proud of the man he is today.”
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Hunter’s history-making trial opens just four days after his father’s likely rival in the upcoming presidential election, Donald Trump, was convicted on 34 felony counts in his own landmark trial in Manhattan.
Trump was found guilty of falsifying business records in order to hide a hush-money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels that was designed to protect his 2016 presidential campaign from being damaged by the emergence of Daniels’ claims of having an extramarital romp with Trump a decade earlier.
Hunter’s trial came after the collapse of a deal with prosecutors last year that would have seen him plead guilty to tax charges and enter into a pretrial diversion program on the gun charges. After the deal unraveled, Justice Department special counsel David Weiss brought two prosecutions against Hunter.
In addition to the gun case, Hunter is set to face a second trial on tax charges in September in California.
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