WASHINGTON — DC US Attorney Matthew Graves announced Monday that he will resign before President-elect Donald Trump retakes the White House — likely avoiding an involuntary departure after controversial decisions not to criminally charge first son Hunter Biden and most local crimes.
“Serving as the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia has been the honor of a lifetime,” Graves said in a statement announcing his resignation, effective Jan. 16.
“I am deeply thankful to [DC Delegate Eleanor] Holmes Norton for recommending me; to President Biden for nominating me; and to Attorney General [Merrick] Garland for placing his trust in me.”
Graves was at the center of numerous controversies — including allegedly covering for the first family and also choosing not to prosecute a large share of people arrested in DC during a violent crime wave early in his tenure.
He broadly confirmed last year the allegations of IRS whistleblower Gary Shapley that he declined to partner with Delaware US Attorney David Weiss on tax charges against Hunter Biden, allowing for the statutes of limitation to bar charges for some years of non-payment during his dad’s vice presidency.
The Biden-nominated US attorney argued during congressional testimony that such cooperation rarely happens because “there is no way” to “get up to speed on everything.”
“As a manager, in general, we don’t want to do that. And on our end of it, if it’s an ongoing investigation, there is no way, whether it’s 3 weeks, 3 months, if it’s been a multiyear investigation, that we can get up to speed on everything that has occurred beforehand,” Graves said.
“So you’re kind of buying a mansion without an inspection, and whatever problems exist, you are buying those.”
Graves confirmed that Weiss called him to request help bringing the charges in DC, where the first son lived during his father’s vice presidency.
About three weeks after that phone call, Graves said his office declined to partner following a review of case material covering allegations that Hunter Biden, as second son, failed to pay taxes on income from foreign employers, including Ukrainian gas company Burisma Holdings, while living in DC.
“To the best of my recollection, no, I didn’t review any underlying case materials,” he admitted.
“I think the best way of characterizing the decision was, we instructed — I instructed to say that we weren’t going to pursue being a local counsel on the case.”
Weiss ultimately was elevated to be a special counsel, allowing him to file tax charges against the first son in Los Angeles for non-payments spanning 2016 to 2019. The first son pleaded guilty to $1.4 million in tax fraud in September after a Delaware jury convicted him of three gun felonies in June.
President Biden issued a blanked pardon for his son on Dec. 1.
The DC US attorney’s office uniquely prosecutes both federal and local crimes in the nation’s capital — leading to Graves also taking heat for a low prosecution rate of those arrests for alleged infractions.
In fiscal year 2022, a whopping 67% of cases featuring an arrest were not charged by Graves’ office — with him defending that decision by citing the fact that DC’s crime lab lost its certification.
“There were absolutely too many cases where we wanted to go forward and couldn’t go forward,” Graves said after lowering the non-prosecution rate to 56% in fiscal 2023. “As a career prosecutor, it is incredibly important to me to hold people accountable for their criminal conduct.”
