Sen. John Curtis is pushing for an investigation into whether the sons of President Trump and former President Joseph R. Biden used their proximity to power for personal gain, a week after a Putin-connected Russian businessman was found to have bankrolled Donald Trump Jr.’s lavish afterparty as a wedding gift.
In the Utah Republican’s Monday letter to Senate Judiciary Committee leaders, he urged the panel to subpoena Mr. Trump Jr. and Hunter Biden to testify about potentially using their names to advance private business interests.
The senator pointed to the eldest Trump son’s private island party wedding gift from Russian oligarch Umar Kremlev, who has close ties to President Vladimir Putin.
“A toaster is a wedding gift. A private-island party paid for by a Putin-connected oligarch is something else,” Mr. Curtis posted on social media on Tuesday. “Republicans nearly wore out the subpoena machine investigating Hunter Biden’s foreign relationships. We should not unplug it now. ‘Trust us’ was not enough then, and it is not enough now.”
Mr. Trump Jr.’s active promotion of family-backed ventures — including his crypto firm World Liberty Financial and his paid advisory role with prediction-market platforms Kalshi and Polymarket — also sparked Mr. Curtis’ scrutiny over potential conflicts of interest.
Moreover, the lawmaker pointed to Mr. Trump Jr.’s pursuit of international real estate deals that involve direct meetings with foreign heads of state, such as with Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic as a Belgrade hotel project developed by the president’s son-in-law Jared Kushner advanced.
The senator also cited Mr. Trump Jr.’s links to defense tech startups backed by his venture firm, 1789 Capital. The new companies have secured billions in federal contracts and funding since his father returned to office.
“These reports raise legitimate questions about foreign access to members of a sitting president’s family and whether such relationships can create actual or perceived expectations of favorable treatment,” Mr. Curtis wrote. “They also may create expectations of a returned favor that would not be in the best interests of the American people or our allies, and could even create national security vulnerabilities.”
He doubled down on Hunter Biden, who was on the board of two foreign entities linked to China and Ukraine while his father held or sought public office.
“Hunter Biden has denied involving his father in his business dealings, but there is little question that President Biden’s decades in public office gave his son a degree of access, name recognition, and influence that materially enhanced his value in business dealings and opened doors that otherwise may have remained closed,” Mr. Curtis wrote.
He requested that Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles E. Grassley of Iowa and ranking member Richard J. Durbin of Illinois probe the two sons’ “use of presidential family relationships for private financial benefit, preferential treatment, or access by domestic and foreign interests.”
As part of that investigation, Mr. Curtis urged them to subpoena them to testify about business dealings, relationships with foreign individuals and entities, gifts and benefits received and “any instances in which their relationship to the President was invoked or understood to provide value.”
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