MSNBC Legal Analyst Predicts New Hunter Biden Indictment Will Be Used to Push Him into Tougher Plea Deal

MSNBC legal analyst Charles Coleman Jr. reacted to the news of a new indictment for Hunter Biden by predicting that it was a maneuver by prosecutors to push the president’s son into a tougher plea deal.

The indictment came after a controversial plea deal fell apart over the summer that would have allowed Biden to plead guilty to a gun charge and two misdemeanor tax charges and enter a diversion program that would allow him to avoid time behind bars. But the judge overseeing the case pointed out that the defense and prosecution were not in agreement over key terms to the deal, notably the scope of immunity for Biden. After the plea deal collapsed and negotiations failed to resolve the case, Special Counsel David Weiss was appointed, and had announced he would seek a grand jury indictment.

Anchor Chris Jansing reported the breaking news Thursday afternoon, and then brought on Coleman, a civil rights attorney and former Brooklyn prosecutor, for his reaction and analysis.

Jansing read from the indictment the language accusing Biden of making a statement he knew “was false and fictitious” when he filled out the federal form to purchase a firearm, specifically the part “certifying he was not an unlawful user of and addicted to any stimulant narcotic drug and any other controlled substance.”

“It may not sound like much to the untrained ear,” said Jansing. “Oh, he filled out a form, he lied, he’s a drug addict — this is serious stuff. This is a felony.”

Coleman remarked that he had the “exact same section highlighted” in the indictment, and explained its significance, and how the serious nature of the charges could be used to pressure Biden to take a plea agreement.

COLEMAN: That’s the core of what he’s charged with. You cannot, from a status place, have a relationship, be addicted to or have issues with substance abuse and not report that when you’re buying a firearm, because from a federal standpoint when you are filling out this form, Form 4473, you are prohibited from doing that.

So when you do that, you are intentionally making a false statement on an application to a gun seller for the purposes of securing a firearm, which you are not lawfully enabled to have — and that’s what he’s charged with here, and that’s why he’s indicted.

JANSING: Let me look at this because it says lying on a firearms transaction record, again, is a felony, could carry a prison sentence up to ten years, although prosecutors will rarely, you know, go after something like that, but what do you see realistically happening now? Do they go back to the bargaining table? What happens?

COLEMAN: I expect that this is going to be used as another conversation around a plea deal. I do think that we will likely see him plea to the indictment…You still have these tax charges that are wrapped up, out there. In order to put all of these things together, it is likely that we’re going to see him plea, and I do think this is going to reopen conversation around what it is that’s going to be necessary to get Hunter Biden to actually take a plea agreement. I don’t necessarily see this going to trial.

JANSING: OK, let me look at those two tax charges. A tax evasion conviction, the prosecutors must show that a person intended to avoid paying taxes they owed. That can bring up to five years in prison and maximum fine of $100,000. How complicated or not is that to prove?

COLEMAN: You know, I think that a lot of this is going to be determined by not necessarily how difficult it is to prove, but how much Hunter Biden wants to get away from this, and what I mean by that is, if you take a step back, we’ve been talking a lot, probably more so than usual about the notion of indictments and what indictments look like. This is not a particularly “speaking” indictment in terms of what it lays out. It lays out the bare necessities of what you will need in order to establish something that’s going to hold muster in court. A speaking indictment would have far more information in it.

Where I’m going with this, Chris, is ultimately when you’re talking about the tax charges, the amount of information that the government provides the public in an indictment is not necessarily as relevant until you get to the point of whether there’s going to be a trial. I suspect that ultimately the government is going to give enough information to lay out — not necessarily to establish their full case — but enough to survive an actual indictment not being thrown out and to get Hunter Biden to the point of taking a plea.

Watch above via MSNBC.