Republican senator wants to investigate presidential family profiteering

Utah’s Republican United States Senator, John Curtis, called on the Judiciary Committee leadership to investigate the business dealings of presidential family members, urging the panel to subpoena Donald Trump Jr. and Hunter Biden to testify about whether they used their proximity to power for private gain.

In a three-page letter sent Monday to Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and ranking member Dick Durbin, D-Ill., Curtis said the inquiry is necessary to restore public trust in government and to ensure that congressional oversight does not begin and end with a change in party control of the White House.

The request marked a rare break by a Republican senator from the Trump administration and underscored Curtis’s growing willingness to challenge his own party just weeks before the November midterm elections.

The catalyst was a ProPublica report that Umar Kremlev, a Russian oligarch with ties to President Vladimir Putin, spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on a wedding after-party for Donald Trump Jr. in the Bahamas in May.

The festivities included a private island rental and a fireworks display.

“A toaster is a wedding gift,” Curtis said in a social media post. “A private-island party paid for by a Putin-connected oligarch is something else. Republicans nearly wore out the subpoena machine investigating Hunter Biden’s foreign relationships. We should not unplug it now” .

President Trump said last week that his son would repay Kremlev, describing the gift as “totally allowed.” Donald Trump Jr. and his wife, Bettina, have defended accepting the gift, calling Kremlev a “dear friend” and saying the celebration came after their wedding ceremony .

Curtis, who replaced former Sen. Mitt Romney last year, framed his request as a matter of consistency. Republicans spent years investigating Hunter Biden’s foreign business dealings with entities in China and Ukraine while his father held or sought public office. Curtis argued that the same standard should apply to the Trump family.

“The country should not have to accept one standard for the family of a Republican president and another for the family of a Democratic president,” Curtis wrote. “Nor should congressional oversight begin and end when control of the White House changes hands”.

The letter did not accuse either Trump Jr. or Hunter Biden of direct wrongdoing. Instead, Curtis asked the committee to determine whether existing ethics, disclosure, or anti-corruption laws were violated and whether legislative reforms are needed to prevent the presidency from becoming a vehicle for private enrichment.

Beyond the wedding, Curtis cited Donald Trump Jr.’s promotion of family-backed cryptocurrency ventures, his pursuit of international real estate deals involving meetings with foreign heads of state, his reported investments in defense contracting and his financial and advisory ties to prediction market platforms that depend on favorable regulatory decisions from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission .

Hunter Biden responded to the request on social media, writing, “Bring it on.” He said he would testify without a subpoena and suggested that Eric Trump and Jared Kushner appear as well.

Grassley said he would take Curtis’s request seriously but cautioned that such hearings require months of preparation and that the Senate has only six weeks remaining in session before the end of the year. He is not expected to be chairman next year due to term limits .

Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, a committee member who is not seeking reelection, endorsed the idea. Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., also a committee member leaving at the end of the year, said he had no problem with investigating and described Trump Jr.’s acceptance of the gift as “colossally bad judgment at best” .

Durbin, who is retiring, praised Curtis for showing “real courage” and said on the Senate floor that “this sort of thing cannot be allowed to happen without some response from Congress” .

Not all Republicans welcomed the move. House Majority Whip Tom Emmer, R-Minn., dismissed the push as “a new Russia hoax” and criticized the Senate for spending time on the matter rather than passing House Republican priorities .

Curtis is a freshman senator and does not sit on the Judiciary Committee. He has occasionally bucked his party in the past, including declaring in an April op-ed that he would not support funding for continued military operations in Iran unless Congress votes to authorize the conflict.

The Utah Republican is also weighing his political future at home. Politico reported in May that his inner circle had been canvassing donors and allies to gauge support for a 2028 gubernatorial bid, though Curtis said at the time that he is “happy where I am” and focused on his Senate work. He is planning a 250-mile solo walk across Utah this summer to honor the nation’s 250th anniversary .

Utah has a history of electing maverick-style Republicans willing to cut deals across the aisle, but such lawmakers frequently face primary challenges from the MAGA base. Romney, Curtis’s predecessor, served only one term before concluding he had no path to reelection after voting to impeach Trump .