U.S. Rep. Nick Langworthy, R-23rd District, is opposed to any forced migration or any circumvention of Chautauqua County’s emergency order prohibiting the illegal housing of asylum seeking immigrants out of New York City into Jamestown or Chautauqua County.

Local Congressman Nick Langworthy defended fellow Republican Donald Trump Thursday, downplaying the most recent indictment against him while pointing to investigations against President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter.

“It’s no great surprise,” Langworthy said when the OBSERVER sought his thoughts about the indictment after he visited Dunkirk. He noted the Trump indictment came a day after incriminating testimony from one of Hunter Biden’s business partners.

Hunter Biden is under scrutiny for tax evasion and questionable business dealings with foreign partners. He was supposed to plead guilty to tax evasion in a plea deal with the Department of Justice, but the judge deferred accepting the agreement.

Two committees in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives are also investigating the Biden family’s business entanglements.

Trump pled not guilty to four felony counts Thursday afternoon, not long after Langworthy spoke. Trump was indicted Tuesday by Special Counsel Jack Smith on charges related to his efforts to undo his 2020 presidential election loss in the run-up to the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the Capitol, including conspiracy to defraud the U.S. government and conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding. The charges could lead to a years-long prison sentence in the event of a conviction.

It’s the third criminal case filed against Trump this year, but the first to try to hold him criminally responsible for his efforts to cling to power in the weeks between his election loss and the Capitol unrest that stunned the world as it unfolded live on TV.

“The political timing is so absurd,” Langworthy said. “We have the President’s Department of Justice trying to jail his chief political opponent. No matter what you think of President Trump or any president that’s come before him, we’ve never had prosecution of a former president based on political activity.”

He continued, “I just think this is a hyper- political weaponization of the Department of Justice… I think the American people are waking up that it’s just too damn coincidental on the timing of things.”

Langworthy called the three cases against Trump “interference with the presidential election process.”

— The Associated Press contributed to this article.