Hunter Biden and Kathleen Buhle were married for nearly 24 years and have three daughters together: Maisy, Finnegan, and Naomi. In her candid memoir, If We Break: A Memoir of Marriage, Addiction, and Healing, published in June 2023, Buhle describes how she learned about her ex-husband’s affair with Hallie, the widow of Hunter’s late brother Beau.
According to People, Buhle wrote that her daughters Finnegan and Naomi broke the news at their family therapist Debbie’s home. “Debbie,” Finny said once we had Naomi on speakerphone, “can you tell her? We can’t do it.” Debbie looked me in the eye and calmly said, “Kathleen, Hunter’s having an affair with Hallie,” she wrote.
She continued, “I received the kind of call that tightens every parent’s chest. ‘Mom, I need to talk to you,’ Finnegan mumbled through tears. ‘I’m at Debbie’s.’ As I ran to my car, my mind went into intense fear. ‘Are you okay?’ I asked. ‘Please, just come,’ she said. I’d taken all three girls to see Debbie a few times to discuss Beau’s illness and Hunter’s drinking. ‘What happened?’ I asked again, so scared. ‘I don’t want to tell you over the phone,’ she said.
Three miles later, I was at Debbie’s house. I went straight through to the sunroom and found Finnegan curled in a chair, holding a pillow while she wept. I wrapped my arms around her. ‘Everything will be okay. All right?’ I told her. ‘I love you.’ ‘Oh my God.’ This was all I said. Was this what shock felt like? ‘How do you know?’ I finally asked. ‘We found his phone,’ Finnegan said. ‘There were text messages between them,’ Naomi added.”
“We called Hunter,” Debbie said. “We told him we found the phone and that we knew.” She looked directly at me. “From now on, Kathleen, no more secrets. I told the girls that from this day forward, you will tell them the whole truth”, As per Vanity Fair.
Despite the painful revelation, Buhle shared that she has forgiven her ex-husband. “I have forgiven him, yes,” she said. “Anger is such a heavy weight to carry and I was in a lot of pain. A lot happened that was very hard for me. And when we decided to divorce, I wanted to let go of all of that.”
In Hunter’s memoir, Beautiful Things, published in 2021, he described the end of their marriage differently, writing, “as mutually desperate grasping for love we both had lost, and its dissolution only deepened that tragedy.” He added, “It seems obvious now, but then it was this unspoken, unacknowledged dynamic that had begun to impel us both: the idea that we could keep Beau alive by being together—that by loving each other we somehow could love him back into existence.”
While appearing on CBS Sunday Morning, Hunter defended his relationship with Hallie, calling it ‘love out of grief’. “I think people were confused by it,” said Hunter. “And I understand that. I mean, I really do. To me, it’s not something that is difficult to explain. Because it came out of a real overwhelming grief that we both shared. And we were together, and trying to do the right thing. And that grief turned into a hope for a love that maybe could replace what we lost.” Hunter and Hallie were in a relationship from 2017 until 2019.