James Comer Unplugged: Key lawmaker says Biden most corrupt VP in US history

Months into his wide-ranging investigation of the first family's finances, House Oversight and Accountability Chairman James Comer has seen enough to convince him that Joe Biden was the most corrupt vice president in history and he believes his Republican colleagues are moving closer to supporting an impeachment inquiry.

In a wide-ranging interview Wednesday with Just the News, Comer said evidence his committee has gathered showed Biden has lied about several key aspects of his family business, when he as vice president abused the power of his office to take son Hunter Biden aboard Air Force Two so he could prospect for foreign business deals and had no business withholding $1 billion in U.S. loan guarantees in 2015 to force Ukraine to fire its chief prosecutor, who just happened to be probing the Burisma Holdings firm paying the vice president's son.

"Every day the evidence continues to grow that would support impeachment," the Kentucky Republican told the "Just the News, No Noise" television show. "I don't think any vice president in the history of America was more corrupt than Joe Biden. And certainly we're concerned that all the corruption that he benefited from in his family benefited from while he was vice president could have tainted his presidency and made him vulnerable, made our country vulnerable, made him compromised."

As to whether Republicans can muster enough votes on the House floor to approve an impeachment inquiry this fall, Comer said: "Many of us in Congress are already there. We've seen enough. But with respect to my role as chairman, the House Oversight Committee, we're in charge of bringing out all the evidence."

He said his next step was to force the disclosure of the personal bank, credit card and phone records of Joe and Hunter Biden to see how much financial benefit the current president may have derived from his family's foreign exploits. Hunter Biden is quoted in text messages recovered from his laptop that he diverted as much as half of his earnings to his powerful father.

Joe Biden has denied receiving any benefit from his son's businesses, even after emails emerged showing Hunter Biden had paid some of his personal bills as vice president.

"That's why we're continuing this investigation," Comer explained. "And we're going to try to get all the bank records and all the email correspondence that Joe Biden had pertaining to shady business transactions that his family was involved in with foreign nationals."

The chairman also reacted to exclusive reporting by Just the News last week revealing that Joe Biden took the opposite action than was recommended when he threatened to withhold $1 billion in U.S. loan guarantees to force Ukraine to fire Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin. Biden said he did it because U.S. policy was that Shokin was corrupt.

But State Department records show the U.S. sent a letter to Shokin saying it was "impressed" with his office's work and career State, Justice and Treasury officials had recommended Biden give Ukraine the loan guarantee because Shokin had made adequate progress in fighting corruption and reforming the judicial system.

"With respect to this investigation, there was never any evidence that we can find that would suggest that Shokin was corrupt," Comer said. "The only thing that we could find on Shokin is he was investigating corruption. And he was investigating Burisma, which was a corrupt energy company that Joe Biden's son was getting paid millions of dollars to serve on the board."

Beyond the conflict of interest, Comer said, Biden's intervention in Ukraine appeared to be interference in the internal affairs of another country. 

"I've been studying and we're still studying and doing the research. But I've never found a time when anyone from the United States in a leadership position went to a foreign country and tried to withhold foreign aid in exchange for terminating an individual." he said. "Now I've heard where people will go to foreign countries and say, You're gonna have to reduce your carbon emissions, or you're gonna have to stop selling arms to certain countries that may be trying to attack Israel, or you may need to watch your business transactions with China.

"But never hey, you need to fire your prosecutor who's investigating my son's energy company. That's never happened before. Nor should it ever happen again. And I think when this investigation is over, we're going to pass major legislation that defines influence peddling and bans it forever," he added.