A consulting firm partnered with Hunter Biden aided a Chinese Communist Party-owned company’s efforts to construct a mine in the U.S. to extract a mineral critical for the production of fertilizer, which would ultimately be exported back to China.
The unearthing of the Biden family’s ties to the fertilizer business comes amidst news of shortages of the resource plaguing the global farming community, especially the United States.
The Thornton Group, a consulting firm working on behalf of the Chinese state-owned enterprise, describes the company Rosemont Seneca, which was founded by Hunter Biden and Obama-era Secretary of State John Kerry's stepson in 2009, as its “American partner,” in a now-deleted description from its website.
Additional deleted pages from the Thornton Group's website dating back to 2010 mention joint meeting with Hunter Biden, even explicitly referring to him as "the second son of current US Vice President Joe Biden."
The Thornton Group and Rosemont Seneca Partners were also the sole American organizations comprising BHR Partners, a notorious $1.5 billion investment fund that was underwritten by Chinese Communist Party-run banks and officials. It was birthed less than two weeks after Hunter Biden accompanied his father, the then-Vice President, on a trip to China.
A now-deleted post to the Thornton Group’s website titled “Thornton Group visits Luxi Chemical,” originally posted on May 10th, 2015, details the consultancy’s work with Luxi Chemical.
Luxi Chemical is a state-owned enterprise in China manufacturing chemical products, particularly fertilizer.
The webpage reveals that leaders from the two groups met to plan “cooperation” on a “large-scale high-quality potash mine project in the United States,” allowing the Chinese company to “import a large amount of red potassium from the United States every year”:
“The two parties had a sincere and friendly conversation on the cooperation of a large-scale high-quality potash mine project in the United States, and happily reached the long-term cooperation intention of Luhua Group to import a large amount of red potassium from the United States every year. Red potassium is the main raw material for the production of compound fertilizers. The stability of raw materials is very important. Luxi Chemical Group has been eager to find a stable source of imported goods. With the cooperation with Thornton Group, it will be more conducive to the stable production of Luxi Chemical.”
“The two sides agreed that Thornton Group will visit Luxi Chemical Group again in June this year, and the two sides will discuss and sign a specific cooperation agreement at that time,” the post added.
No archives are available, however, of subsequent meetings.
The supply of potash, which is the synthetic component of fertilizer supplying potassium, is currently experiencing record-breaking prices and has seen its key suppliers undergo shortages.
Separate webpages from the Thornton Group reveal Biden’s involvement with the company, including traveling to China for meetings with its executives. On its website, ostensibly used to woo prospective clients, the Thornton Group explicitly wrote “Hunter Biden (the second son of current US Vice President Joe Biden)”:
“The Thornton Group and its American partner, Rosemont Seneca, Chairman Hunter Biden (the second son of current US Vice President Joe Biden) and other senior executives visited various Chinese financial institutions and fund companies from April 7 to 9.”
