Hunter Biden’s daughter Naomi testified Friday that her father appeared stable during a 2018 rehab visit, contradicting other testimony about his drug use around the time he purchased a firearm under scrutiny in his federal trial.
The 30-year-old told jurors that when she and her fiancé visited Hunter Biden at a Los Angeles treatment facility in 2018, he was “the clearest he had ever been since my uncle [Beau Biden] died,” according to her testimony. She said he “seemed really great” at that time.
Naomi testified that she borrowed her father’s truck weeks after the firearm purchase to drive from New York to Washington and found the vehicle in good condition with no visible drug paraphernalia or evidence of drug use.
Contradicting Testimony
Her account conflicts with testimony from Hallie Biden, Hunter Biden’s ex-girlfriend and ex-sister-in-law, who said the vehicle was filled with drug paraphernalia and trash during a visit around the same period.
Prosecutors questioned Naomi about a text message she sent her father around five days after the October 2018 firearm purchase. She had written, “I’m really sorry dad I can’t take this,” in a later October message when attempting to spend time with him in New York but found him unreachable.
Courtroom Disruption
A confrontation outside the courthouse drew attention as Naomi Biden yelled at Garrett Ziegler, a former White House trade policy official who worked with Trump allies on opposition research against Hunter Biden before the 2020 election. “You have no right to be here, you Nazi piece of s-!” she said before walking away and later returning to sit beside First Lady Jill Biden.
Hunter Biden sued Ziegler and his company Marco Polo in September 2023, claiming they violated state and federal laws by creating a searchable database containing 128,000 emails.
Trial Context
The trial centers on allegations that Hunter Biden purchased a firearm in 2018 while addicted to drugs and lied on the background check form. FBI agent Erica Jensen testified that the laptop in question was obtained via subpoena from a Delaware computer shop where it had been abandoned in 2019.
The device’s contents have been central to Republican criticism of President Biden, with some materials suggesting connections to his son’s foreign business dealings.