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Tucker Carlson
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Hunter Biden
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Tucker Carlson
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Hunter Biden
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Tucker Carlson
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Hunter Biden
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Tucker Carlson
Thank you for doing this, Carlson. I haven't seen you in 11 years, though I've talked about you, as you
Hunter Biden
know, in the meantime.
Tucker Carlson
And then I wake up one morning and you're doing Candace Owens.
Hunter Biden
I love Candace.
Tucker Carlson
I, I do too. I do too. I've taken a lot of abuse for saying that, but I do, I know her and I, and I do, I
Hunter Biden
think she's a great, as a person. Yeah. Forget the, the politics and, and anything. And, and largely why I'm, I'm sitting here, we've known each other for, you know, quite tangentially for 30 years.
Tucker Carlson
Yes.
Hunter Biden
Is that she is a human being, is a really, really good person and, and thoughtful and generous and has a deep faith and, and I just vehemently disagree with some of her positions. And it used to be that way.
Tucker Carlson
I remember.
Hunter Biden
Remember, I mean, when you and I knew each other, it wasn't as if our politics were much different.
Tucker Carlson
Right.
Hunter Biden
And, but everything has, everything changed. And I, and I, I attribute it to one thing. We can get to that. But what's the one thing I took Donald Trump, everybody says he's a symptom of the disease. And the reality is that I think he's one of the most transformational individuals in our political history. Offer for ill. And I think he had such an opportunity to do great things and he just decided that all he was going to do was for himself. And, but anyway, regardless. Well, I mean, we have two hours to talk.
Tucker Carlson
We're from the same place.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
I grew up with your, with your high school girlfriend? I think so. I mean, I, you know, we're, I'm very familiar with the world that you're from because I'm sort of from it too. And I noticed the change during Obama and I'm not blaming Obama, I'm not blaming any. But the society changed. It was like all of a sudden if you didn't like Obama, you were a Racist.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
And I felt like in our neighborhood, that was advice. You couldn't say anything about Obama that wasn't positive.
Hunter Biden
Yeah. Do you remember that now? I mean, I, and I think that I had a completely probably different perspective on that, but I don't, I don't discount if, if you say that you felt that way.
Tucker Carlson
Well, it was before then. Like, if it was Clinton.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
You know, I knew a lot Clinton staffers and you could be like, really Monica Lewinsky and they'd be like, yeah, Monica Lewinsky. Or Bush, you know, really? The Iraq War. Yeah, the Iraq. You know, it was like. Yeah, but people seem to lose their sense of humor in 2008, at least my neighbors did. It was like, what did you, I'm sorry, did you see something about Obama that's not flattering? And that to me, yeah, I can
Hunter Biden
see how you would get that. You know what I mean? I mean, you're, you're a public figure. You're, you're on.
Tucker Carlson
No, I mean, like dinner.
Hunter Biden
Yeah, no, I know, but I mean,
Tucker Carlson
and it was the ladies who were all about Obama. Remember that? It's like all the, this whole thing of like well educated, humorless, rich white ladies that all began during a.
Hunter Biden
That may be the case. I, that wasn't it understandably was not my experience that it wasn't.
Tucker Carlson
And so how did you wind up deciding to speak in public and with, first of all, with Candace, which I strongly approve of, but I just like, how did that happen?
Hunter Biden
So the, the first interview that I did was with Andrew Callahan and who is a brilliant, in my opinion, journalist and documentarian. And I didn't know anything about him, but I had a lawyer that had done some work for him that had also done some work for me. And he said, hey, you should check this guy out. And I did. And what I noticed about Andrew is that I believe he has a real finger on the pulse of what's happening, particularly to a certain demographic, like draft age, 18 to 35 year olds. And he has a wider audience also.
Tucker Carlson
And it's funny that you say draft age. That's an interesting way to put it.
Hunter Biden
Yeah. We may be coming up to.
Tucker Carlson
Anyway, do you think we're gonna get a draft?
Hunter Biden
No, no, I don't think that they have the. I, I, I, No, I don't, I don't think.
Tucker Carlson
Because that's when like I physically joined the protest at that. I mean, that's so crazy.
Hunter Biden
Well, I think you should physically join the protest now. I mean, you're already there and, but anyway, I met with, I, I, I watched a lot of stuff that Andrew did. I, I really liked it. And, and, and I went on and you know, I think that the thing that kind of shocked people was my willingness to be completely open about all of the, about everything is that I don't, I welcome any question. I always say that addiction is, is never an excuse, but it's often an explanation for, for some of the things that people, the narrative that they've been told about me. Um, and they did a beautiful thing to me that was, that was ugly in the moment, which was they completely exposed me in a way that I don't know of any public figure or, or person associated with public figure, particularly family, has ever been exposed. You know, I mean they literally stole 22 years of my entire digital footprint from every deleted image to every deleted text to everything. And in that total exposure there was nowhere to hide. And for me I realized is that the only way to out was through is owning the things that were true and speaking truth to the things that were false. And I did that with Andrew and I thought it would just be a one off. But then I, I, the guy named, well, you, you're close with him and I, I, I consider him a, a friend by text. I, I don't want to sell his reputation. Yeah, is Sean Ryan? And I, and I sat down with Sean Ryan and, and Sean is kind of, you know, Maga adjacent. He was between 2020 and 2024 and, and he had said some pretty rough things about my dad. Not so much about me, but about my dad that I vehemently disagreed with and to this day vehemently disagree with. But I thought that Sean was a great listener and I really appreciated his willingness to not allow what he had been instructed to believe to infect the way in which he listened to. And I sat down with him and we did close to six hours. And I know that seems like this is a very public thing by virtue of everybody watching here, but the fact of the matter is these experiences in this long format can be very intimate.
Tucker Carlson
Oh, big time.
Hunter Biden
And that was my experience with Sean. And we, and we connect it on the thing that I have been able to connect with with almost everyone, like universally, which is addiction.
Tucker Carlson
Yes.
Hunter Biden
And recovery. And for me, thank God it's recovery. And I, and I've been sober, clean sober for, and somebody said stop saying clean it. So I've been substance free and sober for, for over seven years now. And I don't think people knew that. I think people conflated My. My past addiction with my. My father's presidency and just assumed that I was still using because, you know, I mean, New York Post, you know, I think they. They printed 1.5 articles about me a day for almost close to four years. And. And none of it good. And all of it would.
Tucker Carlson
Not. Not positive.
Hunter Biden
No, not much that was positive. No, not at all. Anyway, long story. The long story a lot longer is
Tucker Carlson
I'm having that experience, the New York
Hunter Biden
Post, at the moment. Yeah. By the way, welcome. Welcome to my world.
Tucker Carlson
I'm not naked, but.
Hunter Biden
Yeah, hopefully, Hopefully. Hopefully, naked pictures don't come out. I could call some of our friends.
Tucker Carlson
No one wants to see those.
Hunter Biden
Yeah, well, I didn't think so either, but. But apparently they do. So, anyway, long story short, and long story longer, I go and I did this with Sean and Sean. And this is public now. I can say it is. Sean had dinner with Candace. They live in the same neighborhood down there in Nashville. And he said, you know, I really, really like her. And she told my wife that one of the interviews that she most wanted to do was with me, with Hunter Biden. I'm not referring myself in the third person right now. I haven't gotten to that point yet. And, you know, I thought about it, and like, you, and we've talked about this a little bit, but like you, McKenzie said some really, really awful things, not just about me, but also about my dad, you know, the whole Biden crime family thing, but really, really kind of pointed things. And I believe that I. If I could sit down with her, not to convince her of anything, but to see that I was just as human as she was and that I own my failings. And I've been incredibly transparent about them. I've been. I have. And I thought that if we could find that, you know, commonality, that we could have an actual conversation. And that's what occurred. And. And I don't agree with Candace still on a lot of stuff. And I almost feel like, why do I have to make that caveat as it relates to it? Because I never used to have to make that caveat. Going all the way back to the beginning of our conversation, how did it change? I truly believe that the level of vitriol, meanness, and cruelty in our politics has always been there, but never like this, never in a way in which it is practiced with impunity. And that, to me, has. I mean, I think that I can market now. It's interesting that you say that, that your experience is that that kind of division started in 2008, but nothing like this Tucker.
Tucker Carlson
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Hunter Biden
All of it.
Tucker Carlson
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Hunter Biden
Not
Tucker Carlson
even on partisan lines. I mean the divisions are so intense. I always thought of divisions as racial or religious. You know, you're Protestant marrying a Catholic, you know, or black person marrying a white person. I feel like the divisions now are ideological and political and that's. I mean, this morning I texted Erica Kirk and Candace Owens both within like an hour of each other. Not related to each other, but just because I really like them both and I'm not embarrassed of that. And I've. And I, and that's my right, by the way. I get to like people whether or not I'm fully aligned with their program. Right. That's my view.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
I've taken so much abuse for that, it's insane. Like, how could you be friends with two people who disagree with each other? Well, I don't know. I am. Right.
Hunter Biden
What world do we live in?
Tucker Carlson
Well, that's kind of how I feel.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
That's strongly how I feel. First of all, I decide who I like. You don't get to decide who I like.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
Don't you feel that?
Hunter Biden
I do. And I, and I think that what it is, it's a reflection of this, is that. Who are you getting that from? You're getting that from other people with niche audiences with big microphones in front of them. You're getting that from the comment section that I know you don't read but other people in your organization read from on X. You're getting that. I think we have literally been torn apart on purpose, not because it was. I don't think that the people that created the social media platforms that rule our lives to this day thought this is what we're going to do. We're going to create something just to tear people apart. What I think that they did was they created a monster in which they realized that it is fueled by division and vitriol and conflict and making you question yourself. I mean, let me give you an example. Remember that the whistleblower for Facebook, when I think Facebook was still Facebook, it happened like in 2022. She was a senior executive at Facebook and she came up to the Hill and this is a nonpartisan thing and she came up to the Hill and she had all of that documentation of internal studies within Facebook that showed that the, that there had been something like. And I forget the numbers, so don't hold me to it, but an exponential increase in the, the number of teenage suicide among girls between the ages of 13 and 17 years old. Exponential that began with the inception of Instagram. And then not only an exponential increase in actual suicides among teenage girls, but a even greater increase like if, if that, if suicides went up triple. Girls reporting self harm went up by like 300% over the course of like a. The inception of Instagram until you know, 2022 when this woman walks in with all the documents. And Instagram knew that and knew that it was literally directly related to their algorithm sending these messages to girls that they are not worth that they, they, they need more that that they, that they're whether it' or body shaming and continuing to send it over to o them knowing the negative impact that it's having, but it's because it made them money is because you become addicted to that. You know that response and that that Instagram would get with that bag of heroin in your pocket known as an iPhone. And you know what they did? Nothing. They buried the report. They literally did nothing. I mean nothing. So my question. And then what happened? This woman whistleblower comes forward. She brings all of the evidence that, that, that Facebook meta knows about this. And she said like now what do we do about it? And you know what Congress did? Senate House. No, you know what they did? Nothing we have done. Absolutely.
Tucker Carlson
Which is suicides of our people. I mean, not a big deal.
Hunter Biden
That's what I'm trying to say.
Tucker Carlson
Bonkers.
Hunter Biden
And, and as it relates to our politics is the same thing. We are being fed the, the, the equivalent of a suicide pact by organizations and companies that are run by, by the way, literally a handful of Very, very, very. Not just generationally, but wealthy people to the degree that we haven't seen since the robber barons at the turn of the 1900s and late 1800s. And those people, I'm not saying, are evil, but what they have created is a tool. And a tool can be either a hammer can build a home or it can tear down your house. And they build a tool, and they make more money by tearing people down. They make more money by dividing people. They make more money. And so they just let the algorithm roll, and it's tearing us apart. And I'm not saying that's the only problem. Not myopic enough to say that all of the issues that we have. But going back to Donald Trump, because for me, the one existential threat that I think that we face as a country is Donald Trump. I am not disbeliever that Trump is merely the symptom of a disease. I believe that Trump is central to why this disease has gone from a local epidemic to a pandemic in the United States of America.
Tucker Carlson
It's not a defense of Trump to ask then why. On the big failures of the Trump administration, the real ones, the ones that history will record, like this war, there's been no pushback from the other side at all. So that tells you. I mean, you could say lots of things about Trump are bad, but getting us into a war we can't win, in which Americans are dying in Iran, that will only diminish America's power and bankrupt us. I mean, that's the only exit, really.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
And make Iran stronger. And, like, no, no. Chuck Schumer is like, yeah, it's bad. But of course, he endorses, like, the whole leadership structure endorses that. So, like, can't really say, like, they like Trump now.
Hunter Biden
Yeah. I don't know if they like Trump.
Tucker Carlson
I think it's a little bit Whatever. But he's doing what they want.
Hunter Biden
I think it's a little bit of a. Well, by the way, I don't disagree that there is an enormous failure of the. Of what I call the. The elite oligarch Epstein class of Washington, D.C. yes. That are. That you and I both know very well. Yes. And that have. That are as interested in protecting their. Their. Their corporate overlords as they are in protecting anything. And I mean, just take like, the. The. The issue of stock trading. Okay.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
My dad in. In 1972, took a vow that he would never own a stock or a bond, and he kept that vow since 1972. In over 50 years of public life. And he retired from the presidency as having probably the lowest net worth of anyone that had ever entered the presidency. And meanwhile, he got tagged with this idea that he, you know, is the Biden crime family and that, you know, all of all of that crap. But my point being is this is that how is it that we have not been able to pass a law?
Tucker Carlson
I couldn't agree more.
Hunter Biden
And I know you do agree, but how is it possible? And it's not just Republicans pass a
Tucker Carlson
law that prohibits members of Congress.
Hunter Biden
Yes, of course, Yeah. I mean, it's the most common sense thing in the world. And it should be in the administration too. It should be anybody with access to the most valuable insider information of all. And meanwhile, not only are we not passing the law, Donald Trump is selling $100,000 early access to his true social tweets, which is just a front running for insider trading literally in the open. And that's what I mean. The, the quantitative, qualitative difference of Donald Trump as compared to anything I've ever experienced in, in, in, in politics before, is the sense that the rule of law is only applies as a weapon rather than as a prophylactic for the Constitution to be able to operate in a way in which the founders envisioned it.
Tucker Carlson
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Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
I would just say I think it's been that way for a long time. And that's just open. Now it's open. It's just obvious if you're selling truth Social access.
Hunter Biden
Yeah, man, but it's like, like, come on, I saw this guy. There's this one. There's this incredible guy on TikTok, and he's a, the professor. But he goes, it's a, it's a red cup garage. He's like a. And he. Have you ever seen this? Well, you don't have any of this. He explains things by using red solo cups.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
And he, he has this thing. Everybody go look at it. It's all of the money that every president of the 45 that came before Donald Trump made in the presidency. Okay. And it's four blue solo cups. Okay. And then all of the money that Donald Trump has openly said that he made in his financial report in the first 500 days of the presidency, and it is over $3 billion and it takes the entire wall.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
It's like.
Tucker Carlson
And I mean, you can't argue that. I mean, president shouldn't make any money in office. Like, what is this? No.
Hunter Biden
And by the way, this whole idea of a blind choice. And so that's what I mean by the qualitative and the quantitative difference and the idea that, that there are still a group of people out there that voted for Donald Trump because they thought that they were going to be able to change things. You know, it talked about this a little bit and before we came on. But my hero and I know that you are a two as it relates to, in public life, people. That is one of them, with all of his faults, was Teddy Roosevelt.
Tucker Carlson
Great.
Hunter Biden
And Teddy Roosevelt, picture of him over
Tucker Carlson
there to my great grandfather.
Hunter Biden
Yeah. I got something for you, by the way. But the Teddy Roosevelt, by all accounts came very close to abusing the power of the executive.
Tucker Carlson
Oh, you think? He certainly did.
Hunter Biden
But he did it because he realized that in order for this experiment to be able to continue, you could not have a, a unfettered oligarch class that drained all of the wealth of a country and put it into their pockets, while the other 99, by the way. And people don't understand this. I'm not talking 1%. I'm talking the point.01%.
Tucker Carlson
Yes.
Hunter Biden
There are only nine, like a little over 9,000 families in this country who are billionaires out of 350 million people. You know what the, the I, this is shocking to me. You know what puts you in the top 1% of income earners in this country? No. Annual $750,000.
Tucker Carlson
That's the top 1%.
Hunter Biden
1%. So the people that I'm talking, I'm not talking about taxing or redistributing wealth among the top 1%. I'm not talking about it even in the top.05%, which would be like 10 million dol. I'm talking about the 0.01%, literally about a little under 10,000 individuals in this country that control and that have almost like 40% of the entire wealth of a nation who decide 9,000 families have
Tucker Carlson
40% of the internal.
Hunter Biden
I take somebody through the numbers for me, I probably screwed that up completely. But an inordinate amount of, of the entire considered wealth of this country.
Tucker Carlson
Well, you can't have democracy under those circumstances.
Hunter Biden
No, you can't. And Teddy Roosevelt knew that. And what he did is he went out and he used the power of the executive to be able to go out and bust the trust and, and redistribute that wealth. It was called it the square deal. And then he used the power of the executive to do things that are. Every single one of us still benefits from today. Which is, for instance, the national park system. Yes. The entire National Park System was the, was the brainchild of one person as it related to one island, which was Audubon. And he came to Teddy Roosevelt and he said, hey, look, we're losing a, this magnificent place, this island off the, in the, in the Gulf off the coast of Florida. And it, because it has, it's a bird habitat that has, I don't know, like, like half the species of wild birds. And he comes to Teddy Roosevelt and Teddy Roosevelt just goes out and he says, okay, and he turned it into the first national park, I think. And, and then he went out and he did that across the country. I mean, can you imagine doing that today? No, no. And, but you, can you even imagine the people in. Not the people, Donald Trump having a thought about using the power of the executive to benefit anyone but himself first? No, no. And that's the thing.
Tucker Carlson
But I also look back on the last 25 years, 20 years, anyway, and I can't really think of many big executive initiatives that benefited the majority of.
Hunter Biden
No, I. Neither do I. And that may be a question about the, the unitary executive and the, and, and, but no one has ever done it in a way in which the, they're, you know, where literally. I believe that everything that he has done contains not just a, you know, an underlying current of how does it benefit him personally. It is the first thought of everything that he.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah, I think that's true.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
The problem I have with focusing on Trump and I, I'm trying not to be defensive because obviously I campaigned for Trump and with Trump and spoke at the Republican National Convention and defended Trump for a decade on Fox News, so I'm definitely implicated in it. Obviously. But it's not just defensiveness. I. I think two things. One, focusing on Trump as the source of all evil in the world drives you crazy. Like, I saw that happen to my.
Hunter Biden
I don't believe that. Just, you know, I don't believe that he's the source of all evil. Right.
Tucker Carlson
But, you know, people who feel that way, literally. I had one of my closest friends when off the deep end. Yeah. Just like Trump. And all of a sudden, Trump's under the bed and it's like, whoa, whoa, whoa. It's monomania. Yeah. But I also think it's.
Hunter Biden
It's like he was under my bed, just.
Tucker Carlson
Okay, that is funny.
Hunter Biden
Along with some of his. His friends. It is so good.
Tucker Carlson
But second, it's like, exculpatory to the rest of us. It's like. I don't know.
Hunter Biden
We.
Tucker Carlson
I watched a lot of crappy stuff happen in D.C. when, over the 35 years I lived there, and I didn't even recognize it as crappy at the time. And we're all kind of implicated in this. We've had a lot of bad leaders, actually, or mediocre leaders. I don't know. We've had a flamboyantly corrupt leader like this, and we haven't ever. That's true. We've had a lot of low grade, kind of like, what's in it for me? Leadership. And we tolerated it and we celebrated things that were not impressive at all and pretended they were impressive and oh, so brave. And all this is like, it was all crap, actually. We're kind of. This is the end of, like, a long cycle of mediocrity. That's all I'm saying.
Hunter Biden
Okay. So I. I've owned up.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
Okay. To, like, for instance, is I. I'm absolutely certain that my engagement in Washington, D.C. as you know, when I took on Burisma when my dad was vice president as a client at the end of the year is like. It was a stupid thing to do.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
You know, because I wasn't fully aware of the. Of what a swamp it was and the narrative that would be able to be spun. It was a horrible idea. Now, I had my reasons. Okay? But they're not good enough. I own that. I own the idea that. I do believe that there is this revolving door in Washington, D.C. that needs to be shut in, which people come in and out of administrations. We know them all.
Tucker Carlson
They're trading on access, and they're not
Hunter Biden
bad people that are trading on access. I did not trade on access. You can look through 22 years of my, But I know this, I know that I received incredible privileges that no one else in the world, including to, to the point of my pardon, no, literally, there's no one else in the world that was in my position that their father happened to have the authority and the power to do it. And I realize how privileged I, I am. But I think that there is a, I think that there needs to be a reckoning with if, if I'm willing to do that. I think that you and I saw the, the, the, and I like, I like Thomas Massey. I like where, where Marjorie Taylor Greene is going. I like that there are people that have kind of woken up to the. But a lot of the reason that we're here is because of, of Fox News. A lot of it has to do.
Tucker Carlson
Well, we're in a war right now because of that we're losing because of Fox News. I couldn't agree more.
Hunter Biden
And so I, I, I just think that, I don't think that every problem this country faces is because of Donald Trump. I don't think that he is the, you know, the source of all evil. I don't even remotely believe that. I do believe this, though. We are at an inflection point in this country. Whether you, it's because of the technology as relates to AI and as it relates to our debt and the fact that Donald Trump is responsible for what, 20% of the entire debt of the entire nation over the course of the, you know, since its inception. Yeah, it's of course, yeah, bonkers.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
And we are in desperate, desperate need of leadership.
Tucker Carlson
I agree.
Hunter Biden
And so I am, I want, I want to reach across to everybody and say, like, look, let's figure out the things that we can agree on instead of like pointing, you know, the in constantly. And one of the things that I think that we can agree on is that we are, we have the exact wrong leadership at the exact wrong time.
Tucker Carlson
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Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
And I, you know, famously advocated for the Iraq war and thought that was the last stupid thing I was ever going to do. Turns out it wasn't. I advocated for all kinds of things that I now regret advocating for,
Hunter Biden
particularly the things that you said about me is deep regret.
Tucker Carlson
No, I do, actually. I mean, I. Yeah, I mean, I regret in the sense that as someone who has dealt with addiction.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
Not quite as in an exciting way as you did, but I've been there for sure, you know, extend grace to people who are out of their minds. Like, you would think I would do that. I should have done that more. So I do, I do regret that. But no, what I'm saying is, like, you look back and like, I really thought that I could influence Trump.
Hunter Biden
Talk about that.
Tucker Carlson
Not going into this war.
Hunter Biden
I think that that's a really interesting point.
Tucker Carlson
No, I mean, that's, that's the core of it right there.
Hunter Biden
Because you said the things that you said about Trump after 2020, which are famously out there.
Tucker Carlson
Oh, when I got pissed in a text with the producer and then out
Hunter Biden
of context and all that.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah, yeah.
Hunter Biden
One wonderful organization you work for.
Tucker Carlson
Really ridiculous.
Hunter Biden
And so. And talk about how you came around in 2024, not as it relates to, like, you just knee jerk reaction to being opposed to Democrats. But why?
Tucker Carlson
Oh, no, it was a very specific trajectory. I was, I was. This is like such an impossible rich guy thing to say, but it's a fact. I was in Europe with my kids.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
On the med. The August of 2023, I think. And Mar A Lago got raided. And that was like, that was ridiculous on a documents charge, really. And I'm from the city, so like, I know a lot about the document stuff. And it was like transparently absurd. They're literally sending armed FBI agents into his bathroom. Like, no. And so to me, what that said was Trump is actually being persecuted by the uniparty, therefore he is its sincere opponent. And my overriding feeling since I wrote a whole book on this 10 years ago, is that the problem in Washington is that on the big questions of the economy and foreign policy, both parties agree it's the agreement that is the threat, not the disagreement. So I thought that. And I thought, well, Trump is clear. They're trying to put him in jail on these nonsense charges. And they are not. They were nonsense. Well, they're nuclear secrets. That's not true. And I was like, so he clearly is their opponent. So I thought, and this is my sin. I can have an effect. And my goal literally from that moment up until February 28th was I don't want to go with Iran because I really saw that as the end of a lot of stuff, of the, well, the post war order, which is kind of ridiculous, but compared to what, you know, I'm kind of against the post war order. On the other hand, I'm not sure what follows will be better. So I was really focused on this Iran thing and I knew that both parties were for it. Schumer's totally for it, Lindsey Graham's totally for it. They're all colluding against America to start this regime change war with Iran. And I was like, I'm going to single mindedly focus on it. That's all I'm going to do with my life is I'm going to. And I knew a lot of people in the Middle east and I thought, oh man, I can do this. And I realized on February 28, first of all, I had zero power, okay? But it was mostly vanity. I was like, I have a mission. I can do this. And it was, it was. I overstated my own influence, like dramatically in a very embarrassing way and my own importance. And like, I thought I could do things that like, I had no control over any of this stuff. And I was humiliated, correctly, I was humiliated in front of my wife. I was like, you're doing a good thing. And, and so yeah, I was mad at Trump, but I was also really mad at myself. And so that's, that's the story. And I, I've, I actually am really grateful I went through that.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
Because it puts your own power in context. You think like, you've got all this, you know, whatever, swat, and you have zero.
Hunter Biden
Yeah. So what next?
Tucker Carlson
I have no idea.
Hunter Biden
But I mean, I mean, really, what, for me? Yeah. Not, not just for you, but what next for all of us. Like, I am. I've been out talking to people and completely different audiences, you know, across the board. And, and the most significant reason of why I've decided to go out and talk is that what I realize is that my experience is not only not unique, it's almost universal now to the degree that my experience, my addiction, overwhelmed me, is sometimes often exaggerated by virtue of how much attention has been paid to it. You know, there's two years of my life.
Tucker Carlson
Some people noticed.
Hunter Biden
Yeah, some people noticed. Oh, yeah, exactly. God, it was awful. I mean, notice to the degree that, you know, my wife and I were living in the hills in la and we had this little place and, and I was just early in, in my recovery and Trump from the Oval Office invited in these right wings influencers, these MAGA influencers online. And this is back in 2019. And, and he started the Where's Hunter thing. And the next day the New York Post printed an aerial photograph of the house that I live in where you could stand on the street below to be able to look through the, the floor to ceiling windows. And a group of men with bullhorns and MAGA hats showed up at the door, banging on the door with my then pregnant wife who was home alone, who literally fled the house. They chased her in a car and literally ran her off the road. And that was my experience for like a two year period of time until my dad was elected. And then we got Secret Service and, and we had, we, we'd left that house because we. In the middle of the night and a. And the next house we went to, they found us in. This documentary filmmaker ended up being like a. He wrote a whole scripted film. He parked a billboard truck.
Tucker Carlson
We're in la.
Hunter Biden
Yeah, in la, in Venice. I was right on South Venice Boulevard. He parked a, a one of those digital billboard trucks in front of my house that ran all of the nude pictures of me smoking crack actually for a week straight, and then sat on the canal with bullhorns in a canoe and just shouted at my house over and over again for a week. Then we had to leave that house.
Tucker Carlson
Did you know him?
Hunter Biden
Yeah, no, no. God, no. Some crazy guy, you know, I mean, he was not crazy. He was, you know, he then went on to make a. Like a whole movie about me. But anyway, my point.
Tucker Carlson
Did you see it?
Hunter Biden
What did you see? No, I didn't. I did not see it. Do not go see that movie.
Tucker Carlson
Didn't know it existed.
Hunter Biden
But, but, you know, my, My point is that I have. The total exposure that I've had has given me this incredible gift. And number one is that by the. That that transparency is that I don't have any more secrets and the secrets that, That I felt ashamed of. Like just the word crack. Like, you know, I mean, it. It's so heavy. It. It shocks people. All of the associations that people make out of, particularly of our generation.
Tucker Carlson
Yes.
Hunter Biden
And. And to be able to speak about it openly. And, and what I found is, is this deep connection with people. There's no wall between me and them anymore. And because they know all of my flaws, the ones that you would never want to show anyone. And, and they know I'm willing to talk about them. And in that they're able to come up to me and say, I mean, everywhere I go, when I was. Got off the plane in the airport, someone came up to me, told me about their, their experience in recovery. Thanks for what I'm doing. You know, they're, you know, they got. Their brother just got arrested though, is in jail. You know, you gotta do something about the fentanyl deaths here. It's. It everybody. And it's been an incredibly beautiful, beautiful experience. And I say to everybody is that I'll talk about the politics, but it's really the bait to be able to talk about the thing that connects us. And so all the way back, sitting down with Candace, is that the thing that Candace and I were able to connect on in a very human way was her own experience. Not personally, but with her family and addiction and the people that she loved. And I don't know anyone that hasn't been impacted by it, that's for sure. Yeah. And. Well, I guess what my point is is that by starting there for me, I feel like, like our connection as relates to it. I've known you've been sober for, for over. Well over 20 years now.
Tucker Carlson
24 years this month.
Hunter Biden
24 years this month. And, and, and so your. Your capacity to be able to understand it at that level and also at a family level. Oh yeah. Is. Makes it a lot easier to like, you know, see the, see the hunter that you thought that you knew. And I, I think. And by the way. I'm not putting words into your mouth.
Tucker Carlson
No, I think that's, that's 100 true.
Hunter Biden
But the thing for me is that with, with, with you, I. The transformation. Not transformation, because it's not a transformation. Anybody that knows you realizes it's not a transformation is out on your own now and not understandably, like anybody that has a job. Being beholden to corporate structure.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
Fox News is that. I feel as if that combined with the incredible ultimate betrayal and what I mean by betrayal of the, of the promise, the singular promise that was important to you as it related to Trump.
Tucker Carlson
Yes.
Hunter Biden
That we would not get into the potential of ending up in a war, a World War 3 or another incredibly devastating, protracted war in that region that would expand clearly with the entire global oil supply in jeopardy.
Tucker Carlson
It's so, it's so crazy, I cannot even believe it happened.
Hunter Biden
Is that it has given an opening for us to be able to have a, A, a conversation that is more constructive about a way forward. That's my feeling.
Tucker Carlson
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Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
Eight years or whatever. Six years, whatever it's been. And so I just want to ask you directly about it. So the laptop comes out or doesn't come out. I hear that it's in circulation. I get calls from people in that kind of shadowy way that. Yeah, you're familiar.
Hunter Biden
Way before. Right.
Tucker Carlson
I can't, you know, I can't remember. Anyway, so much drama has happened. But, you know, if you're in the news business or politics, like, you. You know, people call you. There's this thing, you hear everything all the time. And, like, how much is true? You don't know. I heard about the laptop and. And then I heard, you know, you don't know if it's real. And then I heard somebody calls me, goes, you're on the laptop. And. Because you had written a letter of recommendation for college for my son. Yeah. Who didn't end up going to the school or even getting in. But whatever. It didn't help, it turns out.
Hunter Biden
Thanks.
Tucker Carlson
But anyway, I knew that it was real because who would know that we knew each other.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
Right. No one. No one could fake that. And that are wiser friends and all this stuff. So. But it's Washington. You know, everybody there. So then I hear this story about how. Then the official story comes out about how the laptop was left. You left a couple of laptops in a laptop repair store in Greenville, Delaware, which I'm a town I'm very familiar with, so. And the guy was blind. Then I interviewed the guy who seemed to totally believe the story, John McIsaac. I mean, he seemed to be telling the truth, but the story did not make sense. Meanwhile, I'm getting. We get approached by Israelis connected to Benjamin Netanyahu. Like, I know that. Who are shopping this stuff to me at Fox News.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
And I'm like, I don't think that that part of the story. The laptop is real. I thought that from day one. But the way that it entered the bloodstream.
Hunter Biden
Exactly.
Tucker Carlson
American media was not real. So I just want to ask you point blank, did you drop off laptops?
Hunter Biden
No. And this is the thing that I've said over and over again. I have literally zero recollection of memory of ever dropping off a laptop at John Paul McIsaac's. No. The answer is no. And John Paul Wild. So John Paul McIsaac, who's legally blind.
Tucker Carlson
Yes.
Hunter Biden
Who, on the day when the laptop became public, sat outside of his shop, he gave an interview and flat out says that he doesn't remember seeing me. He couldn't identify me. And also that his security cameras that he has don't have any footage from that Time. And so regardless, though, regardless of anything, just this, the laptop, according to Lev Parnas, under oath in his testimony before the House Oversight Committee, was being sought by Rudy Giuliani in Ukraine in all the way back in 2018. And so Rudy Giuliani is working with a guy named Andre Derkach, who was an MP in Ukraine and a known Russian GRU agent. So Rudy goes over there and basically takes his dossier and receives information that Hunter Biden's hard drive, not laptop, is for sale. And the person that they can go to is this other Ukrainian Russian oligarch who is living in Austria. That's what LED Parnas and Igor Frewin were doing getting on the plane before they were arrested.
Tucker Carlson
So how did.
Hunter Biden
Before John Paul McIsaac was ever a. A twinkle in anybody's eye, I believe
Tucker Carlson
that the story that was always the weak part of the story, like, yeah,
Hunter Biden
he drops off even John Paul McGy, okay, from. There is no such thing as a laptop. The laptop that he turned eventually turns over, year later, 18 months later to the FBI. The thing that he. That is dis. Distributed and disseminated. That John Paul McIsaac claims that he got off of a device was a hard drive. And that hard drive had a limited amount of information, a limited amount of like, gigabytes. I don't know the difference between a gigabyte and a whatever. And that goes into the hands. He somehow can't find anybody. You can't throw a stone in Trolley Square without hitting someone that knows me personally. And he knows that he's lived there his whole life. Instead, what he finds through this guy Applebaum is Rudy Giuliani's lawyer, Bob Costello. He turns over this hard drive. The hard drive becomes the platform from which all of the other stolen information, from which, by the way, every single, you know, forensic expert has made it clear is that there's no possible way all of the information that was eventually labeled as my laptop came from one laptop. It's like the, The. It's way too large.
Tucker Carlson
Came off the cloud.
Hunter Biden
Exactly. They hacked my cloud. They. There's a. I. I write about this in this book. So on Substack, I'm. I'm like laying all of this out and. And there's a whole, you know, the ndi. The whole thing about. There's these different silos, there's the Netanyahu style, the Israeli side, there is a Russian, Ukrainian side of it, and then there are the US actors that include Steve Bannon, Rudy Giuliani, Miles Gao, and a whole Bunch of, you know, Le Paris and. And Igor Fruman and all of these guys.
Tucker Carlson
Well, once the material starts circulating, the data from the cloud.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
You know, all kinds of people get involved and they're shopping it for different reasons. And I agree.
Hunter Biden
Yes. And so it. But my point is, who stole it? Well. From the cloud.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
Well, I don't know. You have as good a guess as mine in terms of actually who. Who was the original hacker of that information? Who has the capacity to be able to do it? And so, you know, I have.
Tucker Carlson
You don't have evidence.
Hunter Biden
I don't have a. A, A forensic. A digital forensic evidence that it was hacked by this person or this entity or this organization, that it was Mossad or that it was the GRU, or that it was. Or that it was some kid in his basement and, you know, that, you know, figured it out. But here's the point. Overall, here's the thing is I get caught in these conversations about all of this, but the reality is this, of what was distributed, that was authentic. It's all mine. All those emails.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah, yeah, I got Buckley.
Hunter Biden
And you know what? You know what? Not a single one of them proves of any criminality of my father whatsoever, of any way in which I ever sent an email saying, hey, Dad, I need you to get this done on behalf of a client of mine. Now, I think that's dispositive, and I challenge anybody, because it's all out there. The entire digital footwear. And I'm not just talking about my emails. I'm talking about. Or 20 years of emails. I'm talking about 20 years of text messages. I'm talking about erased voicemails. Like deleted voicemails, deleted photographs.
Tucker Carlson
They don't actually delete what you're saying.
Hunter Biden
They clearly don't. I mean, voicemails from my dad to me, but that's not the only voicemail that was out there. But not a single one of them. In which I say, hey, when my dad is in office or in power as vice president or president, in which I say, hey, Dad, I need you to do this for me, or even contacting one of his staffers. So either I'm incredibly, incredibly, incredibly good at inactive addiction as a crack addict, or it doesn't exist. It truly, literally doesn't exist. The entire narrative of the Biden crime family. I mean, I, literally, unlike anybody else, is like I say to everybody, okay, show me your phone. Because I showed you mine and you didn't find a goddamn thing. Not one thing. Every investigative body in the United States of America has investigated me for over 10 years at that point. And not one single thing of criminal activity other than use of drugs and all of the things that are, that are associated with a, with, with addiction is proved by the laptop.
Tucker Carlson
So is the world getting more stable or less stable? That's a rhetorical question. We're not in charge of the world. But you are in charge of. In fact, we're still responsible for your own family and your savings. The dollar has lost nearly a third of its purchasing power in six years. That's crazy. You know, it hasn't.
Hunter Biden
Gold.
Tucker Carlson
That's one reason you should think about gold right now. It's about 25% below its high from earlier this year, which is amazing. Gold, relative to its power and endurance is pretty cheap right now. Central banks are reducing their reliance on treasuries and increasing their holdings of, yes, gold. Ray Dal, founder of the world's largest hedge fund and a friend of ours, recommends holding up to 15% of your portfolio in gold. We started Battalion Metals to give Americans an honest, fair priced way to buy metals. BattalionMetals.com Tucker is the place to go to learn more about buying metals. Gold and silver, precious metals, IRAs, secure storage, all of it. Battalionmetals.com Tucker, When did you find out that the contents of your digital life were in circulation that day that the
Hunter Biden
New York Post released it?
Tucker Carlson
You had no idea?
Hunter Biden
No idea? None.
Tucker Carlson
What were you doing that day? How did you find out?
Hunter Biden
So it was like two weeks before the election, right? October.
Tucker Carlson
So up until the day you had no clue because the FBI had the material?
Hunter Biden
None. No. No clue. Zero. Zero.
Tucker Carlson
I'm sorry I stepped on your answers. What were you doing that day when you found out?
Hunter Biden
I was with Melissa and Bo was, let's see, about eight, six months old. And a friend of ours, we were in LA and a friend of ours said, hey, come out to Palm Springs. I got a Airbnb on like a, a golf course there and it's really cool. You guys never been out there and it's like we're, we're in the home stretch now. It's like, you know, I have survived the, I mean, because even before the laptop, remember, I mean, they were beating the shit out of me. That's when Donald Trump was doing the Where's Hunter thing. I didn't have any, you know, security like I don't have today, but I didn't have then is, you know, it was just me and Melissa and, and a baby. And anytime we went outside the house is like, people would follow us everywhere. And not just to follow us, but to harass us. And because Donald Trump was going to his rallies and his big line was, and they were selling shirts, where's Hunter? So everybody felt it was incumbent upon them, if they supported Trump and maga, to find Hunter, you know, to go and find Where's Hunter? And so we drive out to Palm Springs, and we get there and we unpack, you know, put my bag into my room, and there's like, a little plunge pool out of the back of this little house. And. And I get a call, and it's a friend of mine who was also my lawyer at the time, and he said, some guy saying the New York Post is saying, somebody has your laptop. And, you know, it took me years to piece it all together. And so one of the things that I've done over the course of the last seven years, other than paint, which became literally the. I've always painted, but it was literally the thing that saved my life. It just allowed me to focus and occupy my hands in a productive way in which I felt that I was creating and also allowed me to get out of myself and not be consumed by the, by the shame and of, Of. Of my addiction and all the failings that I perceived in myself at that moment in time, which, you know, in early addiction and not just through your own experience, but through the experience of watching others, is a really tenuous time. And, And I've done a lot of writing, and. And it took me a long time to figure this out. Like, what happened? How did this. Who was involved? And there's all of these names, and there's like a, you know, a list of 20 Russian names and 20, you know, I mean, all of this stuff. And, and so I decided on Substack, what I could do is I could basically do the first draft of that and get the audience potentially to participate and give me more information. So I'm doing that on Substack now. And the thing about it is this, is that it was a complete and utter surprise to me. I had, like, we had. I, I, I was, you know, a little over a year into my, into my recovery. I kind of made it through the, the, like, what I thought that was the worst of it. And then we were just literally thrown in the middle of it. And the worst thing happened was, is that because they were nude pictures, and this is the only reason that Twitter took them down and Facebook took them down, is they violated their own internal rules as it relates to revenge porn. You're not allowed to publish nude photographs of anyone without their consent, no matter what, for. For whatever reason. And so that's why on the front page of the New York Post, in the story associated on the digital with all of the links, were like a ton of nude photos with me, of me. I'm just barely blurred out of the women that were in it all consensual, legal, all those things. But of course, they don't make that point. And. And that's why they took it down. But then that became the story, you know, the suppression and this idea that 40 former intelligence officers said it all. It had all the hallmarks of a Russian disinformation campaign. No one in that 40, regardless of what you think of them, not much. Yeah, I know you don't. But no One in that 40 ever said that the laptop wasn't real. But that's what everybody on the right decided to say, that, first of all,
Tucker Carlson
yeah, you know, the intel people are the most dishonest people in our society.
Hunter Biden
I'm not going to argue on behalf of anybody. All I know is let's just stick to me.
Tucker Carlson
No, but I'm just saying, like, the point of that statement was to suggest that the contents were not real.
Hunter Biden
Well, you may think that, but it definitely did not say that. And all I know is this. When it was, it became completely out of my control. So therefore, now I was not arguing about what was on it. Remember what Rudy Giuliani did? He went to the. Literally the courthouse steps in Newcastle county with Bernie Kerik, and he held a laptop, which there's no existing laptop. He had taken a hard drive or a thumb drive and put it and pretended like there was a laptop. And the one thing he said was, this contains images of minor children, which. Bullshit. I mean, an absolute, complete and utter effing lie. And that's what he did. Because you know what? It didn't have on it. It had no evidence. And they had it for over a year at this point. It had no evidence of anything other than I was a drug user. But the problem was, and not only drug user, but crack addiction. And the problem was, is that I had gone about nine months before and I had done an interview with the New Yorker, and I admitted everything as it relates to my addiction. It's probably one of the smartest decisions I made. Not in conjunction with anybody, but literally me and Melissa sitting there, and I said, I'm going to tell this guy everything. I have to get it off my chest. I can't have this hanging out there. As my dad moves through a presidential campaign and let the chips fall where they may. And it totally scooped them. And. And so what they had to do is create another narrative around it that is evidence of corruption. So when anybody says, hunter Biden, what's your first thought? Laptop. You know, and can I just say
Tucker Carlson
one thing, though, that this is what I experienced during that time, the allegation that there was abusive minors on the laptop. That came from the Israelis. I'm just telling you that they came to me with that. So I know that. And one of the things that enraged me about the statement from those sleazy intel guys is that they blame the Russians for it. Now, maybe the Russians had a hand in it, but it was the Israelis who were pushing that fact. Fact. I mean, literally, to me.
Hunter Biden
Yeah. So. And you've gone through it.
Tucker Carlson
But they're all such.
Hunter Biden
Is there anything I just, I want to clear with. With your entire, like, you know, not a single thing in my. Anything that is in any way true about that.
Tucker Carlson
Well, that's such a serious crime that I think it's just common sense that if there was evidence of that.
Hunter Biden
You think that it's common sense. But I'll tell you what, about. About 40 million people on. On, on X, don't think that, you know, I mean, it's like there was
Tucker Carlson
an abusive minors in there. If there was evidence.
Hunter Biden
You know, how many people call me a pedophile to this day? Anyway, I, I'll. I'll spare you, but I'm not. And what. But I agree with you. That's exactly right. And you know, it's.
Tucker Carlson
But they were pushing that so hard. And all the retail guys are like, oh, it's Russia. It's like, you lie. You lie. Because they called me. I sent one of my producers out to go meet with one of guy connected to Netanyahu. They were, they were behind that. And I felt that everybody in D.C. knew that, but there was so much pressure never to criticize Israel in any way that they were just like, it's the Russians. It's the Russians. They're. They're the ones penetrating our political system. It's like, you lie. Everyone knows what's actually happening. That this was my perspective, and it drove me insane. And by the way, I didn't say that on Fox News. I'll admit it. I didn't. Yeah, I didn't. You're right. I just want to say I'm was part of the problem also, but I knew it.
Hunter Biden
But that's the thing, Tucker. Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
I Agree.
Hunter Biden
Is that I. So. So we're here now.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah. No, I didn't say.
Hunter Biden
I'm saying what I'm saying, but we're here now.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
And that's one of the reasons why, just on a purely selfish basis for me, is that, like. I don't know how you could possibly have thought that of me. And by not saying it, I thought that you thought that of me. I mean, it was one of. It's like. It's like I. I am. It. It is thought that.
Tucker Carlson
The child molestation thing or whatever.
Hunter Biden
Yeah. Like all the stuff that they were seeing or any of it. You know what I mean? Like the. The.
Tucker Carlson
Well, people addicted to drugs, especially cocaine, I know for a fact, get pretty dark. That's just a fact. They do. They do. They definitely do. And it.
Hunter Biden
Oh, yeah.
Tucker Carlson
And the cocaine, by the way, it's all there.
Hunter Biden
You can watch it all.
Tucker Carlson
I guess I don't need to tell
Hunter Biden
you that you can see the.
Tucker Carlson
You're not the only person. I've seen this.
Hunter Biden
Exactly. But there's a big difference up your sex. Yeah. There's a big difference between that and. And the reality of what's out there, which is the worst thing that you could possibly say about any. And that's my point. My point is, is that I thought I was over it. I was in Palm Springs. I was there for about three hours. It was the first time that Melissa and I'd gone away because remember, you're. We're still in that kind of COVID Period and people. And so we're. We're out there and I get this call and I'm. And it just like your whole world kind of like, you know, just like this kind of void opens up and you just like, think that you're about to get sucked into it because what's the worst thing that you could ever say about someone, in my opinion, is that.
Tucker Carlson
Oh.
Hunter Biden
Is the. Is the reality that you're. And that's what Rudy Giuliani was saying. And.
Tucker Carlson
And you ever close to going back on drugs during this period?
Hunter Biden
No. No. And. And because I knew this is that I. I don't want to give people the impression that it's not available to them that. That. But it was a miracle. The miracle of my life at that moment, despite that. Despite all of these consequences like. Like just not. Not. I mean, landing like nuclear bombs in my life, is that I was in a better place and continue to be in a better place than I've ever been in my life. Because I would like you Know, I've been stripped to the bone. There's nothing. There is no. There was no facade like you have to. The entirety of my ego was. Was destroyed. Like all of those things that you protect that out of fear. Well, yes, you don't realize that they're out of fear, but almost all of them are out of fear. It's like you're talking about the vanity.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
Of believing that you could change the course of the. Of the administration of history, of being there and that you could overlook all of the things that you know of him in order to save the world. Like, that's a beautiful thing to hear someone admit to being that introspective. To be able to do that in the same way. I was so emasculated that I had to make a decision to live or die. And in the living. I had to live in that, in that, that emasculation, that completely stripping of ego. And, and it didn't, it wasn't instant and it wasn't like I woke up the next morning and didn't think like the sun would ever come up, which I kind of felt.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
But then Bowie woke up, you know, and little nine month old or six month old at the time, and I look at this amazingly magnificent woman that has saved me, that is lying there and. And I thought, you know what? I have to choose to live. Like, like, like I. I want this life, I want this love. I don't want to be afraid. I'm going to choose to live. And I would. And then it just became a matter of moment by moment having to make that choice at the beginning.
Tucker Carlson
Your wife and get sober.
Hunter Biden
I know it's crazy story and I write, I wrote about it and I like I said that if any of my children came to me and, and, and told me this story, I would probably have them committed. But it was truly love at first sight. A long story that, that I've written about, but. And I was in active addiction and staying at a hotel and
Tucker Carlson
where.
Hunter Biden
The Petite Hermitage in, In West Hollywood at the time.
Tucker Carlson
I know.
Hunter Biden
Hotel. Yeah, yeah. And I was at the pool. I got kicked out the next day, but on the roof. On the roof. And in this. These two people sat down next to me where I was alone. I was reading a book. And they struck up a conversation as the pool kind of filled up during the day. And at one point they turned to each other. No, I never met them before. I said, you have to, you have to meet our friend Melissa. And I said, sure, sure. And. And I had no intention of meeting anyone. I'd gone to LA basically to, to, to, to choose the coward's way out of, of suicide, which was I knew that the drugs and drinking would eventually take me and, and I broken all contact with every, anyone that cared for me or loved me. And they called every day and I just didn't answer. Now and I'm sitting there and it was an incredibly, incredibly dark moment in my life and the darkest. And for some reason I, I did this thing. I said, yeah, yeah, just give me your number, I'll call. Because they insisted, they insisted, they insisted that I call this, this woman. And I said I can remember any number. If you tell me a number, I can remember it. And, and of course I, I can't remember a number, but it was my way of getting out of the situation and I had left my book there. So like two hours later I came back to pick up my book at on the Chase lines that I looked at and the woman said, what's the number? And I said, and she said, I knew you were lying. And she had a pen in her hand and she wrote it on my, on my hand. And that night I was taking a shower and I did, I didn't, I couldn't. The difference between 9 o' clock at night and 2:30 in the morning. I, I mean I, I literally was staying up 10 days at a time. I mean it was, it was awful. And, and, and I'm about to wash this off my hand. I thought, I think I should probably really call this woman. So I texted that number and I said, hey, your friends gave me your number. Would you like to get a drink? And at 2:30 in the morning, 2:30 in the morning. And the response I got back was, I'm paraphrasing, but it was like, who the f is this? And it's 2:30 in the morning. No. And, and for some reason I, in the, in the morning I felt like that was really, that's rude to do to a woman. Like it's not just like funny like you made a mistake or like that you like that that was really rude. And I don't know where that it came from in me. The, the, the feeling that I needed to apologize and say I would, I would like to buy lunch. I didn't realize the time I. And, and, and she had no idea who I was. I mean none. And except for her friends met this guy at a pool and so she says that they said you really need to go meet him. And she said she'd be over for lunch, and then it was one o', clock, and then it was two o', clock, and then it was, you know, she'd be there in half an hour, and then it was four o', clock and then it was six. And finally sometimes. Anything about this. What did you. Nothing. Literally nothing.
Tucker Carlson
Just her first name.
Hunter Biden
Yeah. And that's it. Nothing. Not a picture, not anything. And I walk up, and now I'm over at the Sunset Marquee, which is up the hill. Because, you know, every hotel, I say I didn't. Wouldn't do anything wrong. It was just like the. The cast of characters that would be in and out of my room, they decided that, you know, in the morning. Mr. Biden, we don't have another. We don't have availability. Hotel looks empty to me. Yeah, well. And so I had moved to. Over to this other hotel, and this is when I still a little bit of money to be able to pay hotel bills. And I wasn't in the, you know, the Super 8, but I walk up and there's this outdoor seating area, and I see this woman, and she was wearing a denim shirt just like this. And I walk up to the table, and I know this sounds melodramatic and like I'm making it up, but I looked in her eyes and I. And I saw eyes that saw me. And I said, I know that this sounds crazy, but I'm in love with you.
Tucker Carlson
That's the first thing you said to a woman you'd never met before?
Hunter Biden
The first thing. And again, I know it sounds crazy.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
And the craziest part is, though, the miracle of it is that she didn't run. She saw through me. I mean, she saw it not through me. She saw me. And within three hours, I had told her everything that I had not told the people that tried to love me back into existence for. For the. The previous two years. She literally was. I said. I said, you had two hours in. I said, I have a. I. I'm. I'm addicted to crack cocaine. Like, I'm. I'm. I'm killing myself. She said, that ends today. And it didn't end that day day. It ended. The crack ended within a week. And then the alcohol. Yeah, and the alcohol ended within. Within, like, 20 days, tapering in June. I. I count June 1st is my sobriety date. And, you know, from that moment I said that to her, we were married 10 days later.
Tucker Carlson
That's one of the craziest stories I've ever heard in my life.
Hunter Biden
And it's. And it remains a Miracle. You know, my daughters. And there's nothing that I love more in the world than. Than them and the. And. And they spent. I always say the greatest sin of my addiction was my absence from my children. As you know, the one thing about my dad always taught me about is it they're being available is. And. And during a time in their life when they love their Uncle Beau, they love their Uncle Bo as much as I loved them. And he was like a second father to them. And in his. And after Beau died and then they. They lost me for a period of time. And there's enormous trauma in that. And my point about talking about the girls is that, like, I don't like my father, my family, my sister, my uncle, my aunt, my aunt Valerie, the. My mom. You know, they all tried to save me. I mean, they. I have the. I have the most incredible family in the world, but it took a stranger to see the love left in me. And. And I don't know why, but it was it to me. And I love to think of it this way, by the way, that it was a miracle that there was something divine about it. And. And I'm a. I'm. I'm a firm believer in that. In the. In. In that faith that sometimes the things that we cannot explain are God acting in our life in a way in which it might as well. That it tried to get to us in every other way possible, and then finally they have to smack you over the head with. Yes, with a hammer.
Tucker Carlson
I believe that so strongly. That is true.
Hunter Biden
That's a fact. Yeah. And for me, that is the truth about all of this, is that I think that I've been given a gift and the gift of my addiction that brought me to that point where it could totally break me. Not for me to go out and aggrandize myself in a way in which I tell a different story than what actually happened, but to tell the actual story. That's why I hate talking about the. The. You know, The. The laptop or this or the. The by you know, defending myself. But the story that I get to tell is that there are such. There is such a thing as redemption. And that's not the outward redemption. This is not like some. This is the inward that you can find the person that is worthy of love in yourself. All of the things and all of the mistakes that I made in my life and when. I don't mean, you know, all of the narrative that has been out there, but the mistakes that I've made in my life in terms of Relationships in terms of, you know, has all been based in fear. Fear not being enough fear. Not a fear of not living up to some expectation. Fear of being found out, fear of being embarrassed. You know, I mean everything from as something as trivial as like, you know, fear of, you know, asking the girl to dance.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
You know, and I drank over that and I used over that. Or fear of, you know, the, of having to come to terms with the trauma of losing my mother and my sister, facing it in any way. Or fear of being found out that I, you know, like that I'm not really as good as I think that I am. That I, that I, I, I am that person that people, you know, want to view as the, the privileged fail son that's never done anything with his life. And all of that fear is evaporated. I'm not without fear. I still, but in a very different way. And there's no way that I could have gotten here without having gone through that. And that's the promise of, of at least not picking up a drink or a drug today. Is that maybe I can get there. I'm saying to somebody, we're talking before. I don't think that there's anything that has more. Guidance in my life than the serenity prayer is being able to really truly understand the things that you can change as compared to the things that you have no control over.
Tucker Carlson
Yes.
Hunter Biden
And that's not about feeling powerless. But for instance, what it made me think of is what you just said.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah, I know. I agree completely.
Hunter Biden
And you, you have it's vanity to
Tucker Carlson
think that you can change certain, like you're in charge of the world now. You're God.
Hunter Biden
I mean.
Tucker Carlson
No, you're not.
Hunter Biden
Yeah. And there's that incredible. And I don't know if it's apocryphal or if it's true. That quote from Mother Teresa in which she says, if, if you want to change the world, go home and love your family.
Tucker Carlson
Exactly.
Hunter Biden
And in loving my family, what I also realize is my family is much larger than my, my immediate blood and beyond just my just first circle of friends. My family is a group of people that are still sick and suffering that are literally to step out that door, that are, that are, that feel that there is no hope and no way out for them and that they are caught in a cycle of degradation and demoralization and violence because of the drug or the alcohol, which is the worst, in my opinion, worst drug that there is.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah, I agree with that.
Hunter Biden
Yeah. And, and, and but it starts, you Know, in the immediate, and then hopefully it radiates out, if it's done with sincerity and authenticity and, and you're not living a double life, you know, for whatever reason, you're not working on behalf of a corporate chill. You're not working on. I'm not, I'm not pursuing a, a goal of which, you know, I, you know, I'm a consultant in Washington, D.C. and I, you know, you know, I mean, like, what, what, what. It was all, it was all. What was I adding to the conversation? What was I adding to the, to the, to the discourse? What, what purpose was, you know, any of, of that at the time? Can I do that anymore? And that's why I'm an artist and that's why I write, and that's why I'm speaking out. And that's why I, I work with an organization called Peak Path Health, which is a great rehab in, in la, but I'm helping set up a foundation for them, for Aftercare. I work with an organization called Boston Universal, which does homeless prevention and, and tenants rights advocacy in, in la. And that's not to say, oh, I'm such a good guy. I mean, because I get paid and I enjoy the work and I think that they're really good people. And I, and I write a substack because I'm, I, I hope to get paid. I hope people go read it so that I can make a living. You know, I was telling you before, my, my, you know, I really believe in cryptocurrency. I really believe in those things. I want to do something in that space. And, you know, not because of any other thing than I believe in it. But you know what? I also want to make some money. Yeah. And that's my life now. I get to say that and say, but this is me. I'm not running for anything. You gave me a platform. I'm going to use it. And not only am I going to use it to benefit myself and my family, but hopefully benefit people along the way. And I would ask the same of you, which I think right now, and not. This is like, who am I to ask? Is that I think that we have such an opportunity to find common ground to do this a different way. You are, if not the most, in my estimation, the most talented communicator of your generation. And whatever anybody has to say about you is that there is no doubt, is that you are a incredibly effective communicator, as is Candace, by the way.
Tucker Carlson
Yes.
Hunter Biden
And I think that you have an opportunity to. And this Isn't like, you know, train all, you know, ammunition on the administrator. I'm saying the opportunity to find that, you know, common purpose.
Tucker Carlson
You wonder if it's, if it's in
Hunter Biden
the, without the vanity of it. And I mean it.
Tucker Carlson
No, no, I strongly agree. I mean, we're here for a reason. And once you're past, once you get out of debt, it's like, what's the point of accumulating money? I, I really feel that's right.
Hunter Biden
And that's exactly the way I feel. Just get me out of the debt. And that's the other thing people don't like. Oh, you like. I mean, millions of dollars, you know, law firms and others. And, and, yeah. Anyway, so, yeah.
Tucker Carlson
You know about that. Yeah. But I wonder if, like, there nothing you have said. You grew up in a very famous political family. I know you grew up in Delaware, but your world revolved around Washington. You went to school there, you live
Hunter Biden
there, went to college there.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah, yeah, I went to college there. You know, the political system really. Well, you've said nothing about it. Basically. You haven't suggested a political solution to any of this. I don't think that's an accident because I think there probably isn't a immediate. I mean, you can make things better in the margins, but, like, the problems that people face are mostly not political problems.
Hunter Biden
No.
Tucker Carlson
Right. So I think that we overstate the importance of, like, voting for this or that guy. I mean, to me, that's the lesson of Trump campaign for the guy. There are things about him I still like. I don't think he's like, you know, he's complicated. Like, everybody is complicated. But, but it didn't work. It didn't work. It didn't matter that you voted for him. You got the same thing that you were going to get if you voted for Kamala Harris. Like, that's, that's my perspective on it.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
And so what does that tell you? It tells you that you're putting your faith in the wrong thing, which is in a political system, whereas there's got to be a real solution that begins with changing people's hearts. That's what I think.
Hunter Biden
Exactly. Exactly. Because it, it comes from us. We're trying to find the problem out there.
Tucker Carlson
Exactly.
Hunter Biden
And it's here. Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
We're the problem.
Hunter Biden
Yes.
Tucker Carlson
Right. No, I, I, I've, I've discovered that about myself.
Hunter Biden
And so all the people out there that have such a problem with me sitting down with you or sitting down with Candace and like, what the. And like, I didn't I'm not hard enough on you. You got to apologize for this and you got to do this. It's like, you know what? F them. Here's my, here's my point. It starts with us. Like, I'm not going to ever change, Chuck. I like, I like I can get into the whole debate about the Democratic Party and whether you're not going to label something democratic socialist. This. You know what I think? I like people who believe in what they have a conviction.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
And they, and, and they're honest about it. I totally agree. I don't agree with everything that Azrahamandani does. But you know what? He has conviction. He has competence. And you know, like, I mean, he balanced the budget. Crime is at record low in New York right now. And regardless of what you think about him, is that like, so from a political perspective, I don't care if it's Zoramdani or Thomas Massie. And I don't agree with 90% of the stuff that in turn. Well, I think I don't. But I don't think that matters in this moment in time. I don't think any of those labels matter in time. I want someone with the courage of their conviction principles, that is. But it all starts here. All starts here. And everybody else can nitpick around whether, you know, all of the labels that we apply to each other and all of the vitriol. And there has to be, like, I think there needs to be accountability for the people that are literally robbing us effing blind that I think there will be accountability for that. I think that. But my point is, in this moment, can we not all see that we are about to reach a point in the evolution of humanity that will be a larger step than in the entirety of the existence of this earth? And so what does all of it matter if you have people that drive me crazy like Elon Musk and every other person that has a hand in which is a handful of them. And what's happening with AI right now telling us in easily within the next five years, if they haven't already done it, that we're going to reach AGI. And if we reach AGI, then we're not more than a maximum of another five years, more likely two or three away from superintelligence. And once that happens, we literally have taken a step in the evolution of humanity, of humankind, and the largest singular step that will ever be taken in our. The exponential way in which things will advance from there is completely outside of our control. And the only thing that we can hope for is that we have leaders that are, that, that have humanity's best interest in mind. And I don't know if I can. What I shouldn't I say, I don't know. I do know. I think we have the exact wrong leadership at the moment.
Tucker Carlson
I totally agree. I so vehemently. Do you know anybody in your life who you talk to who's like very excited about AI? Because I don't, I don't really know anyone who's really for this.
Hunter Biden
Who.
Tucker Carlson
Where's the constituency for this? It seems like the population doesn't want it at all.
Hunter Biden
Yeah, I don't know why anyone would want the. Want it in the way that it's being offered to us. Look, the what. The thing I say is this. It's not theirs. What they're building is off the back of the output of all of humanity.
Tucker Carlson
I agree.
Hunter Biden
It's ours. It belongs to me. It belongs to me just as much as it belongs to a Sam Bushman in the Kalahari. It belongs to us. From the moment that there was a cave painting that was put into a digital database and in a context to the poetry of Shakespeare, to the book that you wrote, to my last podcast transcript. That is what is AI. It's all of ours. Every scientific discovery, every single public dollar, all of it. We own it. And we somehow are going to make like five or six individuals in this country trillionaires by allowing them to literally rob us of that and make it theirs and them decide, like, do you trust Sam Altman to decide the fate of humanity or any of them for that matter?
Tucker Carlson
I've done thousands of interviews over 35 years and I've never had the feeling of wanting to run out of a room more strongly than I had when I talked to Sam Altman. So he's, he's, he's out of 350 million Americans, he's probably 350 millionth of who I trust yet to control the future of humanity.
Hunter Biden
Yet, yet here we are, right?
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
Yet here we are. And, and, and, and you know, what we're doing is I'm supposed to hate Tucker Carlson because he's an anti Semite and he's this. I know you're not, you're not an anti semite. I'm 100% know the United States.
Tucker Carlson
I might know.
Hunter Biden
Yeah. No, that's what my point being is
Tucker Carlson
that I would just say so.
Hunter Biden
My point being is, is that like if it's anti Semitic to point out that Bibi Netanyahu is evil incarnate. Then you know what? I don't know what to say to, I don't know what to say to people anymore. I mean, all you have to do is just open your eyes. Just literally open your eyes, open your heart for one minute.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
And realize, you know, I, it's such an obvious lie.
Tucker Carlson
It's like, who's even intimidated by that anymore?
Hunter Biden
My point is, is like, how is it possible that they're dividing us on things like that? I agree. And I can tell you how it's possible is the distraction that is being created by a handful of individuals and the people that work for them to keep us divided through our algorithm. And as much as you're not a, addicted to your phone because you're not on social media and things like that, the vast, vast, vast majority of us are, myself included, is everyone has a pocket full of heroin and they access it literally a thousand times a day.
Tucker Carlson
So you're saying you got off crack and more impressively, alcohol.
Hunter Biden
Yeah, no, I'm not, I'm not that bad. All I'm saying. Not off your phone. No, no, I am, I, I, I'm very, I'm not nearly, I'm very wary of it. I'm very wary of anything like that. But what I'm trying to say to people is that I'm no better than anybody else. Yeah. I look at my phone just as, you know, as much as anybody else. I don't feel that it is necessarily a problem. But what I do find is like, for instance, is that you gravitate towards the negative things people say about you.
Tucker Carlson
Yes.
Hunter Biden
Way more than you ever grabbed it. To the, to the beautiful things you'll say about me.
Tucker Carlson
That is so true.
Hunter Biden
So I'm on X. And the amazing thing was, is that I, I go on X and I start talking about addiction, but I also start talking about, you know, the absurdity of the moment that we live in and some of the players that are, that are outsized characters in, in this, in this morality tale we're living through. And, and there's these beautiful messages from people about their own struggle and their own addiction. And you're. You my sister. I showed my sister what you wrote about X, Y or Z and you know, she said it gave her the strength to, to make it through one more day. And these beautiful things where people would say, hey, I'm a three time Trump voter, but I just want to say, keep on keeping on, brother. Like, I love you for your, you know, for your recovery. It gives Me, hope. And there's thousands of those messages. But, you know, what happens is that, you know, the. The one that catches your eye, the one that says, you know, you're. Shut up, you. You know, you crackhead pedophile. You know, you're, you know, criminal. And you stole from, like. It's like. And. And it was a great lesson for me in the experience that everyone is having, not just on X, but across the board in which we're all being. And. And it's. And it's purposeful. The thing that I never fully believed, and until I read all this whistleblower, is how intentional it is. And as long as we're looking at each other, as long as we're trying to find all of the things that are wrong with our life in the other. And by the way, whether it's the other that's the immigrant or whether it's the other that's our neighbor, is we're not looking at ourselves and we're not focused on the things that really matter. And one of the things that really matters is we better wake up. Wake up to the way in which we're being led by the nose and have to believe that we all hate
Tucker Carlson
each other and it's making us worse. I mean, there's this. One of my favorite scenes in the Gospel of Luke is, you know, that the parable to Jesus. The story that Jesus tells about the two men who go to pray at the temple. And one's the Pharisee and one's the tax collector. And the Pharisee looks over and says, God, thank you for not making me that guy, because he is a pig. He's a sinner. Unlike, you know, a righteous, good person like me and the tax collector, who knows he's a sinner because he's a thief. And he knows he's a thief. And everyone knows he's a thief.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
Doesn't even look up. He can't even look at God, and he just says, have mercy on me.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
And Jesus says, who is justified before God? It's not the man who turns to the guy next to him and says, I'm better than you. It's the man who knows that he's not better than anybody. That's the man who's justified before God. And I just feel like all of life is that story when you stop looking at other people and being like, you suck.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
And look inside and realize that I suck. Like, that's where wisdom and peace come from.
Hunter Biden
Yeah. There's a. There's a scene in the Gnostic Gospels and I forget what you the Acts of. I forget Acts of Philip or something. Anyway, you know, have you ever read the Gnostic Gospels and really you got to. They're the whole trove of of gospels. I mean a lot of people would say that it's heresy but but it's the and Emperor. You know, when Constantine unified the church under and and declared Catholicism the Christianity the state religion of Rome State religion of Rome they basically effectively chose four gospels and banned all the other ones and they found in I forget the in hominy and harmony these 2000 year old texts which were the other gospels written by Mary Magdalene and written by Philip and written by. And anyway there's part of one is this is. It says Jesus is speaking to the disciples and this is before and he says learn to suffer as I do. And and that is. That is everything that all wisdom comes through suffering. That is true and in that suffering you're able to. You're able to love. In that suffering you're able to see your. To see the other. It's the exact. Exactly what that you were saying in in Luke. Yeah is that is being able to like not being the person casting judgment rather. And by the way it's not mean. It doesn't mean that you are without discretion simply means is that as much as I'm not going to in you know what is the. The idea of like my empathy overwhelms my. My critical thinking. Yes is not that I'm not talking about that I'm talking about however is is if I can feel this strongly about what they're doing to to kids and detention centers in in the United States of America. I can also feel just as strongly about or have as much empathy for. For someone who feels like they. They have been completely left out and without any options that are you know are living in. In Bethel, Maine that feels that every. That this country has completely let them down and is looking for a hope something and an object for their anger. I want to bring them into the fold. You know, I want to be able to talk to them those people that I think voted out of anger and that are still looking for you know, someone to be their retribution
Tucker Carlson
for people who are dependent on alcohol, which is a lot of people. I think you're absolutely right to say it's the scariest of all drugs because it's the most insidious. It's just ubiquitous everywhere. How do you get off it exactly? You said you got off crack in three days or something. Like that pretty quick.
Hunter Biden
Yeah. Well, that's the thing. Is it?
Tucker Carlson
How do you get off? Alcohol?
Hunter Biden
Yeah. Alcohol is the, and I mean this in this sense, and I have people push back on me, but I, I. Alcohol is the most destructive drug that there is, not just by virtue of the fact that it is as ubiquitous as it is. It is physiologically impacts your body, impacts every organ, every major organ, and in particular, every major pleasure center of your brain. It's the only drug other than Bezos Diazepams that you can die from withdrawal from. So everybody always, you know, does the Hollywood version of, you know, how horrible it is to come off of opiates or, you know, or cocaine. And the reality is it's, it's really painful and it's uncomfortable and you think you are going to die. But particularly as it relates to cocaine, it's out of your system in 72 hours. There is no more physiological need for it, and you won't die from withdrawing from it. Alcohol, you'll die, you'll go into seizures. And, and it stays in your body not just for three days, it stays in your body for at least 30, if not more. And, and you've created these, you know, neurotransmitters in your brain that it's. Your, your brain is still crying. It, you know, 30, 60, 90 days later, still crying for you to, to drink. And the worst part is all you got to do is walk out your door. And usually it's not more than, you know, particularly if you live in a urban environment, you know, a quarter of a mile from wherever.
Tucker Carlson
No one looks at you funny when you have a cocktail.
Hunter Biden
No, exactly. And it's encouraged. And so for me, it was hard, hard work is that I this time, didn't I? I've been to a number of rehabs and, and in 2019, after I met Melissa and she said this ends is that I started, I tapered, she had me taper.
Tucker Carlson
How did she know to do that?
Hunter Biden
Got her to completely intuitive. And I mean, it was really, really, you know, incredible. And she tapered me. And then at one point it got really bad and I had to like true delirium, tremendous. And she called a doctor to come over.
Tucker Carlson
What's that like?
Hunter Biden
Literally the feeling that you, if you don't, if you don't remove yourself from your own body, that, that you're gonna die because you, you are, you know, I mean, there's, there's the real potential of you dying from seizures, and it's the most excruciating feeling that I've ever had of any kind of pain. And, And I had gone through it before, but I had done it in a clinical environment in which they just, you know, usually use benzodiazepams to win you that way.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
And so I had weaned enough, but not enough to. To stop that, and so I had to go through it.
Tucker Carlson
Where were you?
Hunter Biden
I was. Melissa had rented a house, this little house for us in the, you know, up in the hills. I mean, hard to get to from anywhere. Like, I couldn't walk. She took my keys, she took my wallet, she took my phone. She raised every number from it. She. That didn't have the name Biden in it. She, you know, I mean, she had to do the hardest thing that for anyone that is. That loves someone is for a period of time, she had to be my jailer and. And my nurse and a. And literally, you know, nurse me back to life. And it is, you know, it was. It's incredibly intense at the beginning, you know, 24, 7, that you have to be there, you know, because you literally could particular with alcohol. Not particularly singularly with alcohol. You could. You could die.
Tucker Carlson
How long did it take you to feel better.
Hunter Biden
In that instance? Ten days before I could ever really eat anything and taste it, actually. Yeah. You know, I mean, or have any interest in not being forced to eat something. And then. And then you start to, you know, you have this kind of. Everything is kind of grayscale, you know, for. Even after you get a little bit of a. A boost around 30 days. And then you try to ride that as long as possible. But what happens in your brain is that. Somebody explained it to me this way, is that you have these little messengers that. That alcohol sends to your pleasure centers of your brain. And so the messengers, imagine them as little birds. In a normal person, a bird flies up to the birdhouse and that's your dopamine or whatever it is. And like a normal, you know, in a normal circumstance, like you have a. You have a happy experience and, you know, sends two birds up and, you know, to live in the. In the birdhouse. And the maximum that you're supposed to ever have is like 10. It's like the happiest what alcohol does is it sends 20 birds at a time. And so it creates 20 birdhouses. And then. And the next time you use it, you want to get. You got to get to 30 bird houses, and then it builds 40 birdhouses, and you have it. Then there's a thousand bird houses. And when you take the alcohol away and you have a normal happy experience, like a cup of coffee in the morning, it only sends two birds. And your brain says, there are 998 other birdhouses that you have to feel for me to feel normal. And you don't have it. And there's nothing in a normal experience that can possibly produce that except the drug. And so your brain, the thing that you think that everyone, of course, has to believe is providing you with rational, logical information, is saying, if you don't get this, you're gonna die. Yeah. And in the case of alcohol, it means it. Yeah, if you don't get this, you're gonna die. And by the way, not only are you gonna die, you're gonna feel like this for the rest of your life. So fix me. And so your brain's telling you. And so the first time that you face a trauma or an obstacle or a. Or something good happens, your brain says, I know how to make it better. I know how to fix it. I know how to make you not feel this way. I know how to make you not have this anxiety. I know how to make you not have this fear. We've done it before. Do it. And that's. That is the. What alcohol at least did as it relates to. To me. But also I'm positive the science of it is anyways, to me, the most dangerous thing.
Tucker Carlson
I've lived it. And that's a amazing description and an accurate one, I think. How do you stay sober for seven years?
Hunter Biden
Almost everything that I do is no longer with the. With the idea that I am, like, living on a knife's edge. In the early days, though, you really do have to really protect yourself, not put yourself in positions of, you know, I. People always say to me, like, well, can I still go to the bar with my friends? Well, not. No. You know, getting clean and sober is really easy. All you have to do is change everything.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
And that everything. And what I really mean by that is that don't go back and put yourself in the same exact circumstances that you were in, where your same group of friends, if they are heavy drinkers or, you know, or your family. Like, if you. If you can't go to Thanksgiving without everybody getting drunk, maybe don't go to Thanksgiving this year if you're trying to get sober. And so that. In terms of changing everything, but stay in it. It. I. I promise you, everybody, it gets not only easier, but there's this thing in. In the program that I practice in which they call the promises in which you will know and experience an ease by which life happens as you are able to live life on life's terms, in which, like everything. It doesn't fix everything. It. Look at me, you know, six and, you know, six felony charges and two trials later and a. You know, and. And it shouldn't. It. It didn't. It didn't solve anything. It didn't solve all the consequences that I had to face. But you know what? Can you imagine what my life would be like? I'd be dead. I'm 100% long dead. If I had decided the only way to be able to fix this is to anesthetize myself. I mean, I would be long dead. And that's what they were hoping. And I truly, truly do believe that. I believe that they knew that the singular, what they perceived as my father's Achilles heel was his family. That regardless when anybody says about Joe Biden that there was nothing more important to him than his family and that he had just lost. Beautiful. And. And that the idea that. That I. I truly believe that they wanted me to relapse, which was equivalent to. To death. I'm. I'm positive they did.
Tucker Carlson
What does that tell you about. I mean, why would. One thing I noticed just being living in Georgetown as a kid and knowing, you know, million people from political families is the families were all dealing with tragedies that. On a bigger scale than normal people. Like, there's something about that environment that is really hard on the. On families. And you see it in the most famous political families. They're all a lot of.
Hunter Biden
I don't know. See that. That's one of the things that. That. Well, number one is I. I really, truly didn't grow up in D.C. right. Yeah. And, you know, we. We really were in Delaware and. Which was different. And. But to your point, is that what I found is this. Is that I lived it publicly. But, you know, Tucker, I. What I found is, is that. I was in a. I forget where I was. And I. The stranger. Somebody's driving me. And he told me a story, and it told me about their life and their addiction and that their. You, you know, their brother was in jail and their father, you know, just got arrested and. And addicts. And I think everybody has those stories. Everybody, that's for sure. Except mine played out on the front page of the New York Post in a way that literally, I don't think it ended for anybody, any political family ever. I mean, even the Kennedys, to the degree in which they, you know. And I really mean that. Like, I mean, the Total evisceration of anything or even the notion that I deserved any privacy. I mean I, I really like, I, I look at some people and I say like, just put yourself in my shoes for one minute. And what level. On what level is it do you think that that was right? You know, I, I look like somebody like Miranda Devine and just on what level could. Would if that was. If that was Ivanka and I'm not talking about like. And just take the. Her existing 20 year digital footprint, everything that she's ever done. It's like, I guarantee you. And I don't. I don't know. I guarantee you. Everybody has a nude. Everybody has a picture that they don't want to see. Everybody has a text message out of context. Everybody has a voicemail they wish that they hadn't left. Everybody has a. An email in which it doesn't have the entirety of the email chain. Like, you know how many conspiracy theories were born out of the fact that I wrote Buckley a. A recommendation to a school which you reminded me he didn't get into. You know what I mean?
Tucker Carlson
Like.
Hunter Biden
Like out of context you are able to do something and it. How is that in any way fair? However that's what happened. And what'd your wife think?
Tucker Carlson
I mean you.
Hunter Biden
I just was thinking about like, like she.
Tucker Carlson
Like talk about she didn't sign up for this.
Hunter Biden
Yeah. Like talk about like, you know.
Tucker Carlson
Yeah.
Hunter Biden
She is so tough. She's like a. She is a. A. She is a warrior. Amazing. She is absolutely amazing. I mean, look, I mean I wasn't. There's no way that I could even prepare for it. And I. And this had been my life. None that I could prepare for it. The fact she didn't run says everything that you need to know about her. Because one much other upside. Well, the truth is that. Bowie be Bo's the. The ultimate upside. My so. But she. She is. She is one amazing person.
Tucker Carlson
What's your plan? You're on a path.
Hunter Biden
Yeah.
Tucker Carlson
It seems like you kind of moved into it sideways. Maybe not with a plan. I don't know. But you're clearly moving in some direction. Where is that headed?
Hunter Biden
I. I don't know. And that's one of the things is that I don't. I know the things that I care about. I care about reaching people that are still sick and suffering. I really do. Because by the way, not because I'm a hero, not because I'm some saint. And I want you know why? Because it's the most rewarding thing that I've ever done in my life. It gives me sustenance. It makes me feel good about myself. I mean, it, like, it makes, it makes it easier for me to make it through the day. And so it's purely selfish. And that's one of the things about sobriety that I tell everybody is that the ultimate goal is to get to the end. And particularly as it relates to the program that I practice, as you get the end of the steps and the whole thing is so that you can be of service to somebody else and not because you are sainted at the end and all of a sudden you're St. Francis walking among the, you know, the forest. It's because it's the thing that saves you. The only way to truly get out of yourself is to do for somebody else is to, you know, to sit here and, and, and, and, and for me, the easy, the easiest is to find other people that have had, you know, same similar experience and, and, and it's not like you have to look far. No. I mean, it's. Around every single corner there's somebody. And that was the beautiful discovery that I had. So there's that. I want to meet. I want to reach a million people in recovery and I want. I've created this thing@HunterBiden.com backslash recovery in which anonymously, for nothing other than to create a storyboard, a story corps, is people get to share their experience, strength and hope. Because what helped save me is, was realizing I wasn't alone. And I want to write about it. And I put it on substack and part of it's free and part of a subscription and I, and, and I want to continue to practice my art and, and ultimately, at the end of the day, is that like anybody else, is that, you know, I want to, I want to have the financial security to be able to, you know, to, to not constantly feel as it. I have to make, you know, choices that I don't want to have to make like anybody else. Like anybody else in their life.
Tucker Carlson
How close are you to financial security?
Hunter Biden
Like, I'm a million miles away. I'm. I'm several million miles away. I am. But yeah, you know, my Winston Strawn wants their money.
Tucker Carlson
Lawyers.
Hunter Biden
Yeah. My. Oh, yeah. All. It's all legal bills. Yeah. And, and anyway, like tens of thousands of dollars. Oh, no. Millions of dollars. Millions of dollars. Millions. I mean, just the. I don't know exactly what it is. I think it's between 4 and 6 million that Winston Sean says I, that, that I owe them for. For My, A couple of convictions and anyway. Yeah, yeah, it's a lot of money.
Tucker Carlson
How do you, how does that affect you?
Hunter Biden
I don't know. I, I would hope that they. Oh, how does it affect me? It affects me in this way is that I have to find a sensible solution and a way through. I really am. Have wanted to avoid bankruptcy because the road back from that is just so long and I'm 56 years old, but I don't allow it to consume me. You know what I mean? I really don't and I can't. It is. I don't want it to be the principal motivating factor for, for everything I do, because the truth of the matter is the mountain. So it's such a long climb that I, I don't, I don't see the solution to it right now, but one will present itself and I think cooler heads will prevail and, and, and, you know, and I'll be able to. I just have faith. I don't know, man. I just have faith, not blind faith. Just work hard. I mean, I'm, I'm, I'm really working my ass off. I mean, everybody says, oh, go get a job. I have two jobs. I have two jobs. And then on top of that, I have all of this that I'm trying to do. And then I'm, you know, I, A whole thing that I've been, I'm trying to build as it relates in, in, in that I, you know, I'm, I'm working my butt off and, and doing that, you know, they, they took away my law license, which means that that avenue that I spent, you know, 25 years working towards to graduate from Yale Law School is not open to me right now. And so I have to, in many ways, you know, reinvent myself, but not out of whole cloth. It's been in the past seven years, you know, I'm really, really dedicated to my art. I'm really dedicated to the, to the, to the work of, of writing. You know, you're a brilliant writer and you, you, you know this better than anybody. It's, it is, it isn't. It is a practice as much as in an art. It's a discipline as much.
Tucker Carlson
Absolutely right.
Hunter Biden
And, and, and so I've been practicing that discipline since I wrote my first book. And, and so I have a lot to say. And, and, and there's ways to be able to do that now and ways to be able to do that that can, you know, that, like, I think it's really important for me to be Authentic about everything. Also the ways in which I can do it, in which I hopefully can put food on the table.
Tucker Carlson
Last question is about faith. How has this affected how you feel about God and changed your. Your relationship?
Hunter Biden
I don't know whether I would say that it's changed, but it is deep in my belief in whether you want to call it. I do. As God is the. The absolute certainty of this. There is literally in both the theological but also metaphysical sense, no distance between me and you or anyone. We are all literally connected. And that connection, that universal connection to everything is what I refer to as God is us realizing that all of our fear is delusion, is being separated. It's a. It's all the idea. And so my faith is in the. The fact that I know that. That there is not a. That there's not a sentient being that is not. That literally is. Is me. And, and I don't know if that makes sense to you, but, but I. I truly believe that there are. There has been a. A. A real thing in my life that has saved me time and time and time again, and that has taught me hard lessons. And that I believe that I cannot explain by. Other than what I choose to call God.
Tucker Carlson
No question about that. And we do get glimpses of the connection between people, all people. I think that's what we refer to as a transcendent moment when we, like, rise above all the things we're concerned with and sort of look down just for a split second. But this happens to people throughout life. And you're like, oh, wait a second. Yeah, you know, people are really connected to each other in a real way.
Hunter Biden
Yeah, yeah. And when you, when you start to get honest with yourself, like really, really get honest with yourself. And I'm not talking about. Everybody has to go through what I went through to be able to get honest with themselves. I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy, but, you know, I think that there are spiritual practices that I did not either have the courage or the patience to endure. You know, I say, like, it's not like I was moving to Rishikesh to sit in a cave and meditate for seven years. Instead, what I got is a trial by fire. And, and, and like I said that, the complete eradication of an ego, not by courage or conviction on my part, but by necessary choice to survive. I had to choose to either stay in bed or get out and live. And if I was going to live, I had to let go of that.
Tucker Carlson
Yes.
Hunter Biden
And I did. And, and for now, today It's a beautiful, beautiful thing. It's a beautiful thing. It doesn't solve everything. It doesn't solve my debt. It doesn't solve my, you know. You know, I. I still got to, you know, put on my pants like everybody else and, And. And. And I still have, you know, to deal with relationship that, you know, like anybody else and in a family that I love. Drives me crazy. I love. It's like everybody else. But I don't have to live a lie.
Tucker Carlson
Hunter Biden, thank you very much.
Hunter Biden
Thanks.
Episode: The Hunter Biden Interview
Date: August 10, 2026
Host: Tucker Carlson
Guest: Hunter Biden
This episode presents an in-depth, unusually candid interview between Tucker Carlson and Hunter Biden. Spanning Hunter’s struggles with addiction, the controversy surrounding the infamous laptop, reflections on the political climate, personal transformation, and broader topics like AI and national division, the conversation frequently pivots between the personal and the political. Both participants engage in self-reflection, mutual challenge, and vulnerability rarely seen in high-profile interviews, offering a nuanced look at topics that have dominated U.S. headlines.
Quote:
“What I think that they did was they created a monster in which they realized that it is fueled by division and vitriol and conflict and making you question yourself.”
—Hunter Biden (15:46)
Quote:
“There’s no possible way all of the information that was eventually labeled as my laptop came from one laptop... They hacked my cloud.”
—Hunter Biden (57:36)
Quote:
“It gets the rest of us off the hook to point to one guy and be like, it’s all his fault. It’s all our fault. Including mine.”
—Tucker Carlson (39:30)
Quote:
“Getting clean and sober is really easy. All you have to do is change everything.”
—Hunter Biden (116:15)
Quote:
“There is literally, in both the theological and metaphysical sense, no distance between me and you or anyone. We are all literally connected.”
—Hunter Biden (128:35)
The tone is confessional, at times therapeutic, at times combative but always honest. Both Tucker and Hunter express regret over past actions, challenge their own ideologies, and appeal for compassion and nuance. There's a surprising lack of "gotcha" moments; instead, the episode embodies the kind of cross-ideological, personal conversation both men say they wish were more common in U.S. life.
This is a wide-ranging, candid interview that moves beyond clickbait headlines to examine the personal costs of public life, the challenge of political division, and the possibilities for individual growth and social healing. Listeners and readers are left with a call for humility, direct service to others, and engagement with the deeper roots of national dysfunction.
Links for further context:
End of Summary