Biden begins Mexico trip as GOP prepares to probe 2016 trip with Hunter to meet ... trends now

President Joe Biden arrived in Mexico City Sunday night, but his son Hunter's business dealings followed him again, in what could be an early preview of two years of Republican investigations.

Biden is currently hunkered down in his hotel, after arriving Sunday night following his three-hour visit to the border in El Paso.

It isn't his first trip here by a long stretch. He was here in 2016, where he apologized for 'heated rhetoric' during the presidential campaign by then-candidate Donald Trump. That was a trip where he was accompanied by son Hunter Biden and Hunter's business partner Jeff Cooper, in one of an array of business deals House Republicans are vowing to probe.

That trip came two years after Biden entertained Hunter and a pair of Mexican billionaires, Carlos Slim and Miguel Alemán Velasco, according to photos on Hunter's infamous laptop.   

Biden's first event is at the National Palace, where he will take part in a welcome ceremony with President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and Dr. Beatriz Gutiérrez Müller of Mexico.

Biden was greeted by the president, who goes by AMLO, upon arrival and the two had a chance to talk during an hour-long ride in 'the Beast,' Biden's presidential limo. 

The long ride was occasioned because Biden landed at the new Felipe Angeles International Airport, a favored project of the president.

 Later Biden has a bilateral meeting with the president, followed by a three-way meeting that includes Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who is arriving Monday.

They will be joined by spouses first lady Jill Biden, Dr. Beatriz Gutiérrez Müller, and Mrs. Sophie Grégoire Trudeau.

Slim, the richest man in Mexico, regularly appears near the top of Forbes' list of billionaires.   

Biden entertained his son's business associates in the vice president's office, including Mexican billionaires Carlos Slim and Miguel Alemán Velasco.

The then-vice president also flew Hunter and his partner Jeff Cooper on Air Force 2 to Mexico City in 2016 where Hunter arranged to meet Alemán's son for meetings over a 'flippin gigantic' business deal.

The revelations, laid bare in photographs and emails on Hunter's abandoned laptop, are the latest in a growing body of evidence calling into question the president’s claim that he never spoke about business with Hunter.

In the light of shocking documents uncovered by DailyMail.com from the laptop, the president now faces serious questions – not just whether he knew about Hunter's controversial business dealings, but also whether he was involved in facilitating them himself while vice president.

The White House continues to fail to respond to any of our questions. 

Hunter and Biden family friend Jeff Cooper hatched a plan in 2013 to invest in multiple businesses in Mexico and Latin America, using their relationship with the Mexican billionaire Alemán family whose late patriarch, Miguel Alemán Valdes, served as president of Mexico.

Cooper, an attorney who worked with Hunter's late brother Beau Biden on asbestos claims cases and donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to Biden political campaigns, was particularly excited by the venture's prospects, writing to Hunter in February 2013: 'This is setting up to be flippin gigantic brother.'

The prospects for profit only grew when Hunter joined the board of Ukrainian gas company Burisma the following year.

He and Cooper sought the help of Valdés' grandson, airline CEO Miguel Alemán Magnani, to forge a relationship with the richest man in Latin America, Carlos Slim, in an attempt to cash in on the privatization of the giant state-owned oil company Pemex for Burisma and themselves.

While Hunter and Cooper were working on their business plans, they managed to get the billionaires Slim, Velasco and Magnani a private 'meeting' with then-vice president Joe Biden.

Hunter and Cooper attended. Photos on Hunter's laptop dated November 19, 2015 show the six men smiling and hugging in the meeting in Joe Biden’s vice presidential residence at Number One Observatory Circle, Washington DC. Emails also show the billionaires met with Joe at the White House. It is unclear what, if anything, Joe Biden discussed with the Mexican billionaires at their meetings and phone call.

The White House has repeatedly failed to answer any of DailyMail.com's questions related to the president and his son. 

It appears there may have been multiple White House meetings, as over a year earlier Hunter emailed White House photographer David Lienemann to ask for photographs of the Alemán family with his business partner and father.

'Do you have pictures from the lunch I had in dad's office (I think on 2/26) with Miguel Alleman Sr. And Jr. And Jeff Cooper? If so let me know and I can send someone to pick them up,' Hunter wrote in 2014. 

In May that year Cooper even asked Hunter if he could get the pictures signed for the Mexican billionaires.

'Any luck on getting those other pics from the WH [White House]-Alemán visit? Or getting a few signed for Miguel and his dad?' the attorney wrote.

The same month, Hunter excitedly sent his business partner and fellow Burisma board member Devon Archer a Forbes article titled 'How Oil Reforms Could Trigger Mexico's Biggest Economic Boom In A Century'.

By the end of the year, their efforts were ramping up. Cooper wrote to Hunter and Archer in December 2014: 'I met with Miguel [Magnani] last night. He has set up mtgs with the Secty of Energy and the CEO of Pemex for Jan 12. Is there any chance that anyone from Burisma could attend?'

Then in January 2015, Hunter laid out Burisma's plans in detail in an email to Cooper, Archer and Magnani.

He proposed the Ukrainian firm pay about $350,000 to access an oil 'data room' run by the Mexican Department of Energy, and laid out the structure of the proposed oil venture.

'The first partnership will be the Alemán entity. This will consist of whomever Miguel determines is necessary to his family's team,' Hunter wrote. 'I believe the current idea is that the Aleman Group will include a U.S. entity that is currently controlled by Jeff and Hunter.

'I (in full disclosure) will most likely be granted equity (commensurate with Devon) from the Burisma side. I am also currently 50% of the equity of the U.S. Entity that conceivably would partner with the Alemán group.'

Cooper and Hunter were working business angles beyond oil. In one email from February 2015 Cooper describes a plan to pitch a payroll systems company they invested in, ePlata, to Pemex, Slim's massive Mexican telecoms company Televisia, Walmart, Uber, and even the Mexican government.

'Don't forget Burisma and the non-Mexi folks too,' Cooper added in his email to Hunter.

'This shiznit is global, cabron.'

Joe Biden's brother Jim also tried to cash in on the potential for bumper profits from Mexico's huge privatization plans, but was apparently late to the party.

In May 2015, he emailed Hunter breathlessly that he had a 'very real deal' involving Slim and a US oil pipeline.

'Have a very real deal with Pemex ( Carlos slim) need financing literally for a few days to a week,' he wrote.

'Have the seller (refinery /slims) and buyer major being delivered from pipeline in ( h/ USA) Nothing is simple but this comes very close. As always the devil is in the detail!

'Any interest on the long skirts part? Need to know if there is any interest asap. Love you, u Jim.'

Hunter and his

read more from dailymail.....