A suggested federal law — dubbed the "Hunter Biden Rule" — was presented this week by the Virginia-based National Legal and Policy Center to the Department of the Treasury's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network.
The work was the NBC's response to an immediate sale of paintings, priced between $75,000 and $500,000, at a Manhattan art gallery by President Biden's son.
Earlier this month, the White House ensured critics that it had a reliable method to prevent influence-peddling: ask SoHo gallerist Georges Berges to keep the buyers' identities hidden from the White House. Critics have said this idea is fatally wrong because buyers' names are sure to leak publicly.
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At the same time, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network cracked down on its urgent warnings that art galleries and museums need to be more alert. The agency issued a call for proposals to help them investigate suspicious art deals, which terrorists and criminal enterprises are increasingly using to hide assets and launder billions, the agency said.
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Last year, a Senate subcommittee on the art industry decided that "the art industry is considered the largest, legal, unregulated industry in the United States." The report, called "The Art Industry and US Policies that Undermine Sanctions," noted that, unlike financial institutions, the buying and selling of high-priced art are not subject to the same mandated "detailed procedures" to verify a buyer's identity and stop money laundering.
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As for the moment, the sale of art only comes under investigation if a financial institution suggests a possibility, with a transaction over $10,000, art dealers told The Post.
The sub committee's report, issued in July 2020, noted that China and North Korea were laundering money through the sale of art and antiquities. In another example, the subcommittee cited a Lebanese-based diamond dealer and art broker who laundered cash through sales of Picasso and Warhol works in order to help fund Hezbollah terrorism. The Office of Foreign Assets Control, which regulates US sanctions, alleged Nazem Said Ahmed hid his wealth in high-end art in order to evade US sanctions.
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The NLPC plan calls on officials to treat galleries like financial institutions, subject to laws under the Banking Secrecy Act, which would require them to support US government agencies "to detect and prevent money laundering" in the buying and selling of art. They also want gallery and museum staff to undergo training in how to spot money laundering.
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