Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) demanded President Joe Biden disclose the “mystery source” who paid him and his wife about $10 million in 2017, the year he left the vice presidency.
In the wake of Joe Biden allegedly accepting a $5 million bribe from the founder of Burisma, Mykola Zlochevsky — who allegedly kept 17 audio recordings of his conversations with Joe and Hunter Biden as an “insurance policy” — Cruz raised concerns about Joe and Jill Biden’s entities that raked in millions in 2017.
“You’re looking at a tax return that has $10 million in cash that came from a mystery source,” Cruz said on his podcast, Verdict with Ted Cruz.
He continued:
Now let’s look at the timing here. The whistleblower says when he was vice president, a senior executive at Burisma offered him $5 million cash personally in order to make a corrupt deal and make official decisions for Burisma. The year he leaves the vice presidency in 2017, he reported over $10 million of income in two corporations that he and his wife set up, and we know nothing, zero whatsoever about the source of that income.
Cruz said the House should demand transparency from Joe Biden about who exactly paid the entities.
“You know what the House of Representatives oughta force him to do — you know what anyone who gives a damn about integrity in government should say? ‘We need the tax returns of CelticCapri Corp and GiaCoppa Corp,'” Cruz said. “Because, you know, what if half of that $10 million is the $5 million payment for Burisma for the bribe?”
“Joe Biden better start sizing up for an orange jumpsuit. Because, as he rightly said, ‘Where’s the money?’ If that’s where the money is, then he’s guilty of a serious felony,” Cruz continued. “We have utterly no idea where that $10 million came from.”
In addition, Cruz, who authored a number of books, explained how Biden’s book deal and speaking engagements likely do not account for the $10 million in 2017:
So, let’s take Joe’s numbers. He’s claiming that Joe netted $12.2 million for a book deal. His book deal sold about 300,000 copies. Now, the $12 million, $4.2 million of that is allegedly from speaking, and I can believe that he probably got pretty good speaking fees, that that’s plausible. That means he’s claiming $8 million of income came from book royalties.
Now let’s do some math. His book had a retail price of $27 for hardcover, $18 for paperback. If you assume a reasonable mix of sales, the average price was $23. On 300,000 books sold, the gross revenue everyone makes is just under $7 million. What Joe is alleging is they paid him $8 million to generate $7 million. The book publisher lost a million dollars and got no money for printing the book. Typically, an author, if you were just receiving a royalty, would have received about 12%. A typical blended royalty, you’d get about 15 percent. For hardcover, about 7.5 percent for paperback is typical. If Joe was receiving 12 percent of $7 million, he would have yielded about $800,000. He’s claiming he got $8 million.
That math doesn’t add up.