Special counsel charges FBI informant with lying
Feb 15, 2024 20:11:46 GMT -5
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Post by tnthomas on Feb 15, 2024 20:11:46 GMT -5
WASHINGTON — An FBI informant has been indicted on two counts of allegedly feeding the bureau false information about President Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden during the 2020 presidential campaign.
Alexander Smirnov, 43, disliked Joe Biden and was arrested in Las Vegas after returning from a trip overseas, according to the Justice Department. The case grew out of the special counsel investigation being led by David Weiss, who is also leading the case against Hunter Biden. Weiss had been appointed by then-President Donald Trump as the top federal prosecutor in Delaware.
The 37-page indictment alleges that Smirnov had been a confidential human source for the FBI since 2010 and "provided false derogatory information to the FBI" about both Bidens after Joe Biden became a candidate for president in 2020.
Smirnov allegedly told the FBI — falsely — that officials with Burisma, the Ukrainian energy company that Hunter Biden worked for, had told him they hired Hunter Biden because he would "protect us, through his dad, from all kinds of problems." Smirnov allegedly told the FBI — again, falsely — that Burisma officials had told him they paid Hunter Biden and Joe Biden $5 million and that it would take investigators 10 years to find the illicit payments to Joe Biden.
A source familiar with the matter told NBC News that Hunter Biden does not know the individual who was charged and does not believe he ever met him.
An attorney for Hunter Biden told NBC News that Republicans had been warned that they “built their conspiracies about Hunter and his family on lies told by people with agendas, not facts.”
“This is just another instance of Chairman Comer and Jordan peddling falsehoods based on dishonest, uncredible allegations and witnesses,” Abbe Lowell, Hunter Biden’s attorney, continued in the statement.
Smirnov's account was critical to Republicans' impeachment inquiry into the president.
“This is the biggest political corruption scandal, not only in my lifetime, but I would say the past 100 years,” Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., chair of the House Republican Conference, told “Fox & Friends” in June of what Republicans had termed the “Biden bribery scheme.”
But according to the indictment, Smirnov's claims to the FBI, which he first made in June 2020, "were fabrications," and, in truth, he only "had contact with executives from Burisma in 2017," when Joe Biden had left office as vice president and "had no ability" to influence U.S. policy.
Alexander Smirnov, 43, disliked Joe Biden and was arrested in Las Vegas after returning from a trip overseas, according to the Justice Department. The case grew out of the special counsel investigation being led by David Weiss, who is also leading the case against Hunter Biden. Weiss had been appointed by then-President Donald Trump as the top federal prosecutor in Delaware.
The 37-page indictment alleges that Smirnov had been a confidential human source for the FBI since 2010 and "provided false derogatory information to the FBI" about both Bidens after Joe Biden became a candidate for president in 2020.
Smirnov allegedly told the FBI — falsely — that officials with Burisma, the Ukrainian energy company that Hunter Biden worked for, had told him they hired Hunter Biden because he would "protect us, through his dad, from all kinds of problems." Smirnov allegedly told the FBI — again, falsely — that Burisma officials had told him they paid Hunter Biden and Joe Biden $5 million and that it would take investigators 10 years to find the illicit payments to Joe Biden.
A source familiar with the matter told NBC News that Hunter Biden does not know the individual who was charged and does not believe he ever met him.
An attorney for Hunter Biden told NBC News that Republicans had been warned that they “built their conspiracies about Hunter and his family on lies told by people with agendas, not facts.”
“This is just another instance of Chairman Comer and Jordan peddling falsehoods based on dishonest, uncredible allegations and witnesses,” Abbe Lowell, Hunter Biden’s attorney, continued in the statement.
Smirnov's account was critical to Republicans' impeachment inquiry into the president.
“This is the biggest political corruption scandal, not only in my lifetime, but I would say the past 100 years,” Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., chair of the House Republican Conference, told “Fox & Friends” in June of what Republicans had termed the “Biden bribery scheme.”
But according to the indictment, Smirnov's claims to the FBI, which he first made in June 2020, "were fabrications," and, in truth, he only "had contact with executives from Burisma in 2017," when Joe Biden had left office as vice president and "had no ability" to influence U.S. policy.