Hunter Biden Admits Burisma Gig Paid for His Crack Cocaine Addiction Struggle

Hunter Biden is getting candid about one of the darkest chapters of his life and how money from his board positions helped fuel his battle with crack cocaine addiction.

In a new interview on the “Dopey” podcast, the former first son admitted that his financial situation allowed him to continue feeding his addiction, even during some of his most destructive binges.

“I never went broke,” Biden said, recalling a two-month-long bender at Hollywood’s Chateau Marmont, where he said he tried to “go out with a bang.”

When host Dave Manheim asked how he managed to “scrape the money together” for cocaine and private bungalows at the luxury hotel, Biden pointed to one of his most controversial sources of income.

“Well, I still had the residual. Like for instance, I still was on the board of Burisma,” he explained.

Hunter served on the board of Ukrainian energy company Burisma Holdings from 2014 to 2019 and was reportedly paid as much as $50,000 per month. The position later became a major political flashpoint, particularly during his father Joe Biden’s political career.

But the 56-year-old insisted he was qualified for the role, pushing back against years of criticism surrounding his appointment.

“What people don’t understand about Burisma is that I went on the board of Burisma because I had been on the board of about 14 other major national and international organizations,” he said.

“I was chairman of the board of the UN World Food Program,” he added, while also pointing to his work with Amtrak, the Center for National Policy and Georgetown University.

Hunter also acknowledged just how little the Burisma position demanded of him, even while he was deep in addiction.

“I took that when my dad was vice president, and then for three years after I was still on the board, and the requirement of the board would be that I would show up for four meetings a year,” he said.

"Even when I was a crack addict and out of my mind, I could show up for four meetings a year," he added.

His addiction, however, was taking a devastating toll.

The former lobbyist has previously written about smoking crack cocaine “24 hours a day, every 15 minutes, seven days a week.” During one particularly difficult period, he recalled living with a drug dealer nicknamed “Bicycles.”

And through it all, his father kept trying to reach him.

“My dad showed up. He literally showed up at my house twice, you know, and just knocked on the door,” the former attorney recalled.

He said the former president would “call, and he'd call,” and when Hunter stopped answering, he would “literally, you know, would drive over.”

In his memoir “Beautiful Things,” Hunter remembered one such encounter with his father.

“He looked aghast at what he saw,” he wrote, remembering when Joe told him, “I know you’re not fine, Hunter. You need help.”

For Hunter, that moment became a turning point.

“Dad saved me,” he said, adding, “When he knocked on my door, he jolted me out of whatever state I was in and saved me by making me want to save myself.”

After years of relapses, the American artist says he eventually became drug-free in June 2019.

“I’m not hanging on by my fingernails this time; the desire, the itch, to use is gone,” he added.