Hunter Biden's lawyers expected in court for final hearing before June 3 gun trial

WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — Attorneys for Hunter Biden are due in court Friday for the final hearing before the president's son is expected to stand trial on federal firearms charges in Delaware as his father's reelection campaign unfolds.

Hunter Biden is charged with lying about his drug use in October 2018 on a form to buy a gun that he kept for about 11 days in Delaware. He has acknowledged an addiction to crack cocaine during that period, but his lawyers have said he didn’t break the law and the case is politically motivated.

The two sides have been arguing in court documents about evidence in the case, including contents from a laptop that he allegedly dropped off at a Delaware repair shop. Defense attorneys question the authenticity of the laptop's data in court documents, but prosecutors say there's no evidence the data has been compromised and that a drawn-out fight over it at trial would be a waste of time. The laptop has been the source of controversy for years after Republicans accessed and disseminated personal data from it.

Prosecutors also plan to show jurors portions of his 2021 memoir “Beautiful Things,” in which he detailed his struggle with alcoholism and drug abuse following the 2015 death of his older brother, Beau, who succumbed to brain cancer at age 46.