It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we hadPhiladelphia asked Benjamin Franklin, "Well, Doctor, what have we got, a republic or a monarchy?" With no hesitation whatsoever, Franklin responded, "A republic, if you can keep it." ~ BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 1787
Hunter Biden profited $4.8 million in retainer and consulting fees from a Chinese energy company though 2017 and 2018, the Washington Post admitted on Tuesday.
After ignoring the story for 532 days after it broke in 2020, the Post finally acknowledged Joe Biden’s son performed business transactions with CEFC China Energy for millions of dollars. Hunter’s windfall follows years of rubbing shoulders with powerful international companies and individuals while Joe Biden was chair of the Foreign Relations Committee and vice president.
In the process of reporting Hunter’s corrupt business dealings, the paper also confirmed Hunter’s previously reported “fake” laptop was indeed Hunter’s “laptop from hell” — the same laptop the establishment media falsely reported as “Russian disinformation” over and over again. In fact, 15 establishment media personalities claimed Hunter’s laptop emails were likely Russian propaganda. perhaps most famously, CBS News reporter Lesley Stahl falsely told President Trump in 2020 that Hunter’s “laptop from hell” could not be verified.
According to the Post’s belated authentication, Hunter secured millions of dollars in just 14 months:
But the new documents — which include a signed copy of a $1 million legal retainer, emails related to the wire transfers, and $3.8 million in consulting fees that are confirmed in new bank records and agreements signed by Hunter Biden — illustrate the ways in which his (THE BIDEN CRIME FAMILY) family profited from relationships built over Joe Biden’s decades in public service.
[…]
Over the course of 14 months, the Chinese energy conglomerate and its executives paid $4.8 million to entities controlled by Hunter Biden and his uncle, according to government records, court documents and newly disclosed bank statements, as well as emails contained on a copy of a laptop hard drive that purportedly once belonged to Hunter Biden.
The Post did not find evidence that Joe Biden personally benefited from or knew details about the transactions with CEFC, which took place after he had left the vice presidency and before he announced his intentions to run for the White House in 2020.
The Post’s authentication follows the New York Times authentication two weeks ago.
In contrast, the laptop was authenticated in October of 2020 by the New York Post’s Emma-Jo Morris, who now is Breitbart News’s political editor. Morris authenticated the laptop before the presidential election, when businessman Tony Bobulinski corroborated his participation in a meeting with Hunter and then-Vice President Biden in Washington, DC, to discuss “the Bidens’ family business plans with the Chinese.”
Bobulinski has since confirmed the famous line, “ten held by H for the big guy,” was in reference to a discussed plan for Hunter to hold equity on behalf of his father.
Joe Biden claimed before the election he never spoke with Hunter about Hunter’s business dealings. “I have never spoken to my son about his overseas business dealings,” Joe Biden told the media.
But the Post reported Tuesday that Hunter had office keys made for Joe Biden, “his mother, Jill; his uncle James; and the Chinese executive, Gongwen Dog.” The office was apparently rented to facilitate the nearly $5,000,000 dollar contract he won from the Chinese energy company. Whether Joe Biden knew his son had keys made for him is unknown.
Hunter is allegedly under investigation for tax fraud concerning his foreign dealings. It is unknown if the investigation may implicate the president of the United States.
Follow Wendell Husebø on Twitterand Gettr @WendellHusebø
HUNTER BIDEN, PAUL PELOSI, JR., AND CHRISTOPHER HEINZ BAG-MEN IN THE BIGGEST CON IN HISTORY ... AT LEAST BILL & HILARY OF THE CLINTON CRIME FOUNDATION GAVE SMALL MEANINGLESS SPEECHES THANKING THOSE WHO GAVE OTHER PEOPLE'S MONEY SOME COVER IN THEIR CON ...
GOP Rep. Matt Gaetz presses FBI's cyber chief on the whereabouts of Hunter Biden's laptop
Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) got into a heated spat over the whereabouts of Hunter Biden's laptop during a House Judiciary hearing on oversight of the FBI's Cyber Division on Tuesday.
The Republican firebrand used his allotted time to grill the division's assistant director Bryan Vorndran, who repeatedly told Gaetz he didn't have any information on where the hard drive belonging to President Joe Biden's son is currently located.
At one point Gaetz tried to enter the hard drive into the Congressional record but was blocked by House Judiciary Chair Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.), who changed his mind a short while later.
'Sir, I'm not here to talk about the laptop. I'm here to talk about the FBI's cyber program,' Vorndran told Gaetz after the lawmaker asked where it was.
The congressman, visibly irritated, tries again.
'You are the assistant director of FBI cyber. I want to know where Hunter Biden's laptop is. Where is it?' he pressed.
The FBI official replied, 'Sir, I don't know that answer.'
Gaetz called Vorndran's claim 'astonishing.'
'Has FBI cyber assessed whether Hunter Biden's laptop could be a point of vulnerability, allowing America's enemies to hurt our country?' the lawmaker asked.
Rep. Matt Gaetz, who is under investigation over sex trafficking allegations, demanded to know how Americans 'are supposed to trust' the FBI if one of its top officials in the Cyber Division could not say where Hunter Biden's laptop is during a heated House Judiciary oversight hearing
Gaetz grills FBI chief over whereabouts of Hunter's laptop
Republicans have been demanding answers after the New York Times claimed to have authenticated a hard drive purportedly belonging to the president's only living son -- more than a year after the New York Post was widely criticized for reporting on the contents of that same computer.
DailyMail.com had also authenticated the information at a time when many on the left wing were dismissing it as Russian disinformation.
The hard drive came from a MacBook reportedly belonging to Hunter Biden, that was left in a Delaware repair shop but never recovered. Within it is a vast tranche of emails and other documents relating to Hunter Biden's foreign business dealings as well as lewd images depicting sex acts and drug use.
Despite Vorndran on Tuesday insisting the laptop does not fall into his division's purview, Gaetz pressed on: 'I mean, Hunter Biden's password on his laptop was 'hunter02.'
'And now you're telling me right here that as the assistant director of FBI Cyber, you don't know where this is after it was turned over to you three years ago,' he added.
Vorndran said that was an 'accurate statement.'
'How are Americans supposed to trust that you can protect us from the next Colonial Pipeline if you can't locate a laptop that was given to you three years ago from the first family potentially creating vulnerabilities for our country?' Gaetz thundered.
He was referencing a massive cyberattack by a Russian-linked group that took down the largest fuel pipeline in the US in May 2021, temporarily leading to gas shortages and pain at the pump for much of the East Coast.
Cyber Division Assistant Director Bryan Vorndran told Gaetz that his questions were 'not in the realm of my responsibilities'
A frustrated Vorndran ended up telling Gaetz it was 'not in the realm of my responsibilities to deal with the questions you're asking.'
'We can do this back-and-forth for the next couple of minutes. I don't have any information about the Hunter Biden laptop,' the FBI official said.
They also disagreed on whether the hard drive constituted a 'cyber asset.'
Gaetz, who is currently being investigated for sex trafficking allegations, told Vorndran: 'You can't even sit here right now and say that you know there's not a point of vulnerability.'
'Is the first family sufficient cyber infrastructure to protect? You don't even know if they're compromised.'
The Republican turned his attention to Nadler, holding up what he claimed to be a hard drive from the president's son's laptop, and asked for it to be entered into the record.
Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.), seated next to Gaetz, appeared to nod in approval.
'I'm not --' Nadler begins to say before conferring with an aide.
The chairman then said he would object to Gaetz's motion.
The laptop, which the New York Times recently authenticated long after right-wing media outlets were blasted for reporting about it, contains compromising and embarrassing images of Hunter Biden
In some of the pictures, Hunter Biden is seen with a crack pipe hanging out of his mouth. His past struggles with drug addiction have been well documented
'What's the basis of that objection?' the Florida lawmaker challenged.
Nadler, speaking over Gaetz's objections, said: 'It may very well be entered into the record after we look at it further.'
After what Gaetz called a 'consultation with majority staff,' Nadler relented and allowed the hard drive to be entered into the record 'without objection.
On the same day Gaetz introduced a resolution aimed at stripping the security clearances of 51 intelligence experts who branded the laptop a 'Russian disinformation' effort in a 2020 letter.
The 'Spook Who Cried Wolf Resolution' would pull security clearances from former top government officials like ex-Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and former CIA Director Leon Panetta -- both of whom signed onto the letter.
The effort is also backed by Reps. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.), Dan Bishop (R-N.C.), Louie Gohmert (R-Texas), Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.), Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) and Thomas Massie (R-Ky.).
Last week House GOP Conference Chair Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.), the third-most powerful Republican in Congress' lower chamber, promised to subpoena Hunter Biden if her party took back control of Congress in November's midterm elections.
'The American people absolutely deserve answers,' Stefanik told the New York Post on Saturday.
She said 'there is no greater ethical concern or frankly conspiracy' than 'whether this president is compromised because of his illegal ties to his family members.'
NOT ONLY IS THE SOUTHERN BORDER WIDE-OPEN, SO IS THE CHECKBOOK!!!
'Biggest fraud in a generation': The looting of the Covid relief plan known as PPP
The official in charge of Covid relief tells NBC News' Lester Holt that programs like PPP were structured in ways that were "an invitation" to fraudsters.
Many who participated in what prosecutors are calling the largest fraud in U.S. history — the theft of hundreds of billions of dollars in taxpayer money intended to help those harmed by the coronavirus pandemic — couldn’t resist purchasing luxury automobiles. Also mansions, private jet flights and swanky vacations.
They came into their riches by participating in what experts say is the theft of as much as $80 billion — or about 10 percent — of the $800 billion handed out in a Covid relief plan known as the Paycheck Protection Program, or PPP. That’s on top of the $90 billion to $400 billion believed to have been stolen from the $900 billion Covid unemployment relief program — at least half taken by international fraudsters — as NBC News reported last year. And another $80 billion potentially pilfered from a separate Covid disaster relief program.
The prevalence of Covid relief fraud has been known for some time, but the enormous scope and its disturbing implications are only now becoming clear.
Prosecutors said Mustafa Qadiri, 38, of Irvine, Calif., used money from the Paycheck Protection Program to buy three cars that cost six figures apiece, including this 2011 Ferrari 458 Italia.U.S. Attorney's Office, Los Angeles
Even if the highest estimates are inflated, the total fraud in all Covid relief funds amounts to a mind-boggling sum of taxpayer money that could rival the $579 billion in federal funds included in President Joe Biden’s massive 10-year infrastructure spending plan, according to prosecutors, government watchdogs and private experts who are trying to plug the leaks.
“Nothing like this has ever happened before,” said Matthew Schneider, a former U.S. attorney from Michigan who is now with Honigman LLP. “It is the biggest fraud in a generation.”
Most of the losses are considered unrecoverable, but there is still a chance to stanch the bleeding, because federal officials say $600 billion is still waiting to go out the door. The Biden administration imposed new verification rules last year that administration officials say appear to have made a difference in curbing fraud. But they acknowledge that programs in 2020 sacrificed security for speed, needlessly.
Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz, who oversees Covid relief spending, told "NBC Nightly News" anchor Lester Holt in an exclusive interview that Covid relief programs were structured in ways that made them ripe for plunder.
“The Small Business Administration, in sending that money out, basically said to people, ‘Apply and sign and tell us that you're really entitled to the money,’” said Horowitz, the chair of the Pandemic Response Accountability Committee. “And, of course, for fraudsters, that's an invitation. … What didn't happen was even minimal checks to make sure that the money was getting to the right people at the right time.”
The criminal methodology varied depending on the program. The epic swindle of Covid unemployment relief has been carried out by individual criminals or organized crime groups using stolen identities to claim jobless benefits from state workforce agencies disbursing federal funds. Each identity could be worth up to $30,000 in benefits, Horowitz said.
The looting of the Paycheck Protection Program worked differently — and it could be far more lucrative. The program authorized banks and other financial institutions to make government-backed loans to businesses, loans that were to be forgiven if the companies spent the money on business expenses. Nearly 10 million such loans have already been forgiven. Many of the loans-turned-grants were for millions of dollars, public records show.
Experts say millions of borrowers inflated their numbers of employees or created companies out of whole cloth. For much of 2020, lenders did little to verify the applications, prosecutors and experts say, in part because Congress required the Small Business Administration, or SBA, which ran the program, to issue explicit guidance that in the interest of getting the money out fast, lenders “will be held harmless for borrowers’ failure to comply with program criteria.” The Government Accountability Office warned of fraud risk, but the program continued under that rule.
“The government spent approximately $800 billion and provided 21 million loans to individuals,” said Haywood Talcove, the CEO for government at LexisNexis Risk Solutions, which works with the government to verify identities.
No one is sure exactly how much was stolen. An academic paper released last year estimated at least $76 billion in potential fraud, and the authors said that was conservative.
The SBA’s inspector general has identified $78.1 billion in potentially fraudulent Economic Injury Disaster Loans, another Covid relief program for businesses. The Secret Service has its own estimate: $100 billion.
The basic scheme, Talcove said, was “really simple.” People went on state websites and took the names of existing businesses or registered new, fake ones.
“There's absolutely no security on there. There's no validation of any information,” Talcove said. “And voila, you have company ABC with 40 employees and a payroll of $10 million. And you go and apply for a PPP loan. It was a piece of cake.”
To find more cases, the Pandemic Response Accountability Committee is employing data scientists who use artificial intelligence to plow through 150 million records searching for fraud patterns. In one case it found that a phone number for a gas station in Houston was used on 150 loan applications. It sends such leads to federal agents who follow up on foot.
One of the centers of the fraud is Miami, where Juan Gonzalez is the U.S. attorney in the Southern District of Florida.
Gonzalez said that unlike with unemployment relief, which went to every person who qualified, lenders had to stop making PPP loans when the money ran out, even though demand continued. The fraud didn’t harm just the taxpayers — it hurt people who needed the money.
The public, he said, “should be very angry.”
“This is billions of taxpayer dollars that has been stripped from them,” he said. “And more angry should be the people who did lose their jobs, who worked for businesses that couldn't apply for this money because it was gone. Those are really the ones who should be the angriest of all.”
Gonzalez said he has seen a lot of fraud in Florida, including billions pilfered every year from the federal Medicare program. But never has so much been stolen so quickly, he said.
“I have a hard time imagining when so much money has gone so quickly into the hands of people who don't deserve it,” he added.
David Hines, 29, of Miami, for example, admitted to a fraud scheme that netted him $3.9 million, according to his guilty plea. Hines, who said in court papers that he struggled with addiction, bought a $318,000 Lamborghini Huracán. He also spent thousands on luxury hotels, jewelry, clothing and dating sites, say prosecutors, who seized the car and recovered much of the money.
Also in Miami, a man and a woman admitted to a complex scheme in which, among other things, they claimed they were operating farms — with many employees — out of small, single-family homes in the middle of the city.
“Once you looked at the paperwork and once you saw what it was, all it took was a drive to the farm to see there was no farm,” Gonzalez said.
In another Florida case, prosecutors have charged a man who they say used proceeds from a $7.2 million emergency loan to buy a 12,579-square-foot mansion, a Lincoln Navigator car, a Maserati and a Mercedes-Benz.
A California couple were convicted in June of stealing $18 million, with which they bought three houses, diamonds, gold coins, luxury watches, expensive furniture and other valuables, prosecutors said. Just as they were to be sentenced, they cut off their ankle bracelets and fled, leaving their children behind, according to the FBI.
They were captured in February in Montenegro. The man was sentenced to 17 years in prison, and his wife got six years.
Their case underscores that most of the defendants have been freed while they have awaited trial and sentencing, even though they have been accused of stealing huge sums.
Washington, D.C., resident Elias Eldabbagh, who appears to have no criminal record, was charged last summer with trying to steal $17 million from PPP and another program. According to his LinkedIn page, he earned a degree in computer engineering from California State University, Sacramento, and has worked in various technology jobs. Among the property prosecutors seized was a Tesla Model 3.
He had been released on his own recognizance as he awaited trial, but he was recently jailed after prosecutors accused him of a new crime — attempting to defraud a bank — while his original case was pending. Court records show he has pleaded not guilty. His lawyer declined to comment.
]In the annals of Covid fraud cases, few have matched the brazenness suspected of Danielle Miller, according to federal prosecutors in Boston, where she was charged. The charging documents in her case say she stole identifying information from a Massachusetts state website and used the information to apply for Covid relief loans.
Prosecutors say Danielle Miller used stolen identities to get more than $100,000 in Economic Injury Disaster Loans through the Small Business Administration and alleged that she spent taxpayer money at luxury hotels throughout California. Miller's lawyer declined to comment.@ killadmilla / via Instagram
In 40 minutes, she had $100,000 in taxpayer money, court documents say. She soon booked a private jet from Florida to California, where she spent $5,500 at a luxury hotel in West Hollywood, court papers allege.
On her Instagram account, which has 34,000 followers, Miller posted photos from two posh hotel stays paid for with criminal proceeds, prosecutors say. Her bio: “I want that.”
“Miller’s criminal record includes arrests in five different states, many of which were related to larceny and identity-related fraud,” the complaint in the case says.
Miller pleaded not guilty, but court records now say she intends to plead guilty to an unspecified charge.
She participated in a recent profile in New York magazine that portrayed her as a child of wealthy Manhattan parents whose life was derailed by the circulation of a sexually explicit video when she was in the eighth grade.
“Honestly, I more so consider myself a con artist than anything,” the magazine quoted her as saying. “You know how they have that saying that you can sell ice to an Eskimo? If there’s something that I want, I’m getting it.”
Danielle Miller, accused of identity theft in an indictment by the Justice Department in July, posted this picture to her Instagram account eight months before she was indicted.@ killadmilla / via Instagram
Hines got six years in prison, and the fraudulent farmers got 18 and 30 months. But Gonzalez and other government officials acknowledge that for every person caught, many, many more have gotten away with it. And while prosecutors have 10 years to go after the fraud, given the enormous scope of the criminality, the Justice Department simply doesn’t have the resources to go after it all.
“I think there's going to be a percentage that we probably will never catch,” he said. “But we're working as hard as we can to catch as many as we can.”
Across the country, only 178 people have been convicted so far in PPP fraud cases, according to the Justice Department. Many more prosecutions are coming, but even if the numbers reach 2,000 — or 20,000 — it will be only a small fraction of the fraud.
So how was this allowed to happen? There are two prevailing theories, one more forgiving of the government than the other.
Many government officials, including Gonzalez, say that because the government was trying to respond quickly during the pandemic, a conscious decision was made to make the application process as smooth as possible, even at the expense of thorough vetting.
“You have government releasing a lot of money as quickly as possible into the hands of people who really need it,” he said. “As usually happens, the faster the money needs to go out, the less likely there are to be the appropriate checks in place to make sure that people who don't deserve that money don't get it.”
“What surprised me the most is just how blatant it was,” Gonzalez said. “How individuals would just go ahead and lie on these applications — get the money and then go ahead just openly spend it … thinking that they're going to do that without anybody checking up on it.”
He added: “Some fraud is inevitable. That’s the price that the government was willing to pay to get the money as quickly as possible into the hands of those that really needed it.”
As for the lenders, he said, “perhaps because it was not their money that was on the line, some of these institutions didn't do the type of diligence they should've done.”
The case of the California couple pursued by the SBA inspector general appears to illustrate that fraudsters were leveraging the apparent incuriosity of those doling out the cash.
Marietta Terabelian and Richard Ayvazyan.FBI
The defendants, Richard Ayvazyan and Marietta Terabelian, got millions of dollars by using stolen identifies to get around Ayvazyan’s disqualifying 2011 conviction for bank fraud, court records say. They texted about the cash that was available: "You need to apply. 10k guaranteed...they don't check for s---...it's all automated."
Days later, they were texting that they had gotten the money. "I did 7 [applications] last night and 4 of them got email that it’s funded...I'm telling you to apply [to] Bluevine," an online lender.
"how much they send u"
"Like over 500 so far."
Congressional officials say they are investigating a half-dozen lenders and service providers, including Bluevine, which processed loan applications for $4.5 billion and touted that a business could get loan approval in five minutes.
Bluevine said in a statement that it used “robust compliance” to reduce fraud in accordance with government guidelines and that it was “regrettable” that the government’s loan programs were “abused by bad actors … despite our best efforts.”
Talcove, whose company maintains huge databases of public records and sells verification services to governments, says the government and the lenders and banks could and should have prevented such widespread fraud.
When Covid relief was proposed, he said, he spoke to Larry Kudlow, then a top economic adviser to President Donald Trump.
“And I explained to him that this was going to be the biggest fraud in the history of our country. And then I was told that you can have speed or you can have security. And that they'd rather just get the money out.”
Talcove said he told Kudlow that banks have the ability to rapidly identify their customers.
Kudlow didn’t respond to requests for comment.
The idea that there is a tradeoff between speed and security “is a false premise,” Talcove said. “It's not true. If you believed that, then some of our biggest companies in this country that face consumers would be bankrupt, right? It is very easy to stop the type of fraud that we're looking at. In fact, the private sector stopped this a decade ago.
“The problem that happened is the states panicked, as well as the Small Business Administration.”
In a statement, the SBA said it “takes fraud seriously, and, as such, all applicants are required to provide certification of their eligibility upon application.”
“Misrepresentation of eligibility is unlawful, and, when appropriate, these cases are referred to the Office of the Inspector General,” it said.
But an official who works on Covid relief and wasn’t authorized to speak publicly acknowledged that Talcove is correct. In the early stages of the loan program, he said, there were few controls. And it didn’t have to be that way.
“I agree,” he said, “that the notion that you had to sacrifice certainty for speed is categorically false.”
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Republican Senator Predicts Ukraine War Will Spark ‘Worldwide Famine’
Today Sen. Roger Marshall predicted a “worldwide famine” will shortly begin as a result of the war in Ukraine, and suggested that U.S. dependence on Russian products that are now under heavy U.S.-led sanctions will play a role.
Marshall, who serves on the Senate Agriculture, Energy & Natural Resources, discussed the implications of the war in Ukraine with Maria Bartiromo on Fox Business earlier today.
“I’m a big agriculture guy,” said Marshall, a medical doctor from Kansas. “12-15% of the agriculture products, corn and wheat, sunflower oil come through that Black Sea. Fertilizers come from that area as well.”
“There is actually going to be a famine in one to two years from now,” Marshall predicted. “I think two years from now will be even worse.”
As Marshall pivoted to the developing Ukrainian refugee crisis and lauded Poland’s response, Bartiromo returned the conversation to Marshall’s famine prediction. She specifically asked it there would be a “famine in Europe” as a result of the war.
“This will be a worldwide famine,” Marshall replied.
“I think it will be even worse next year than this year,” said Marshall. After repeating that Ukraine is responsible for producing 12-15% of the world’s supply of wheat, Marshall explained that Ukrainian farmers will, at minimum, have “problems getting fertilizer” and “problems getting tractors in the field, [because] all the diesel fuel is going towards their war efforts.”
If the war continues, then “there will be a famine across the world,” said the U.S. Senator.
Then, the Kansan explained that American farmers may not be able to meet the increased demand because of increasing prices at home.
“I think American farmers are doing their best to respond,” said Marshall, “but we can’t get fertilizer.”
“The fertilizer prices have quadrupled, diesel fuel has doubled,” he added, “So many of the fertilizers and the herbicides we can’t even get right now.”
Roger Marshall visits the 82nd Airborne stationed in Poland in March 2022
Many countries expressed skepticism at Western sanctions on Russia, and India openly refused to participate in the sanctions because of its dependence on Russia for fertilizer and cooking oil.
Russia was sanctioned heavily by the West after it invaded Ukraine last month following a years long standoff over the disputed Donbass region. Russia claims it launched a “special military operation” to protect ethnic Russians from Ukrainian state violence, while Ukraine and much of the international community say the invasion was unprovoked.
Asked why the United States is dependent on Russia and Ukraine for energy and food, Marshall offered what may be considered an America First response.
“That’s the story of America right now, our dependence,” said Marshall.
“Whether on chips being made across the ocean, or we’ve become dependent on Russian oil,” he lamented. “Why do we keep making the same mistakes?”
Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) introduced legislation on Tuesday, dubbed the “Spook Who Cried Wolf Resolution,” to bar security clearances for 51 intelligence officials who signed on to a letter in the fall of 2020 claiming that the story about Hunter Biden’s laptop was part of a Russian disinformation operation.
On October 19, 2020, 51 former intelligence officials signed a letter titled, “Public Statement on the Hunter Biden Emails,” which claimed Hunter Biden’s emails were a part of a “Russian information operation.” Following the censorship of the New York Post’s exposé on the emails by Big Tech and media tycoons, the New York Times confirmed the legitimacy of the emails on March 17, 2022. As of March 22, 2022, 4 of the 51 signatories maintained their support for the erroneous letter.
“The 51 signatories of the letter who publicly and falsely decried Hunter Biden’s laptop to be Russian disinformation should be barred from holding any level of security clearances indefinitely,” Gaetz’s resolution states.
The 51 intelligence officials whosignedthe letter include:
Jim Clapper, Former Director of National Intelligence
Mike Hayden, Former Director, Central Intelligence Agency
Leon Panetta, Former Director, Central Intelligence Agency
John Brennan, Former Director, Central Intelligence Agency
Thomas Finger, Former Deputy Director of National Intelligence for Analysis
Rick Ledgett, Former Deputy Director, National Security Agency
John McLaughlin, Former Acting Director, Central Intelligence Agency
Michael Morell, Former Actng Director, Central Intelligence Agency
Mike Vickers, Former Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence
Doug Wise, Former Deputy Director, Defense Intelligence Agency
Nick Rasmussen, Former Director, National Counterterrorism Center
Russ Travers, Former Acting Director, National Counterterrorism Center
Andy Liepman, Former Deputy Director, National Counterterrorism Center
John Moseman, Former Chief of Staff, Central Intelligence Agency
Larry Pfeiffer, Former Chief of Staff, Central Intelligence Agency
Jeremy Bash, Former Chief of Staff, Central Intelligence Agency
Rodney Snyder, Former Chief of Staff, Central Intelligence Agency
Glenn Gerstell, Former General Counsel, National Security Agency
David B. Buckley, Former Inspector General, Central Intelligence Agency
Nada Bakos, Former Analyst and Targeting Officer, Central Intelligence Agency
Patty Brandmaier, Former Senior Intelligence Officer, Central Intelligence Agency
James B. Bruce, Former Senior Intelligence Officer, Central Intelligence Agency
David Cariens, Former Intelligence Analyst, Central Intelligence Agency
Janice Cariens, Former Operational Support Officer, Central Intelligence Agency
Paul Kolbe, Former Senior Operations Officer, Central Intelligence Agency
Peter Corsell, Former Analyst, Central Intelligence Agency
Brett Davis, Former Senior Intelligence Officer, Central Intelligence Agency
Roger Zane George, Former National Intelligence Officer
Steven L. Hall, Former Senior Intelligence Officer, Central Intelligence Agency
Kent Harrington, Former National Intelligence Officer for East Asia, Central Intelligence Agency
Don Hepburn, Former Senior National Security Executive
Timothy D. Kilbourn, Former Dean, Sherman Kent School of Intelligence Analysis, Central Intelligence Agency
Ron Marks, Former Officer, Central Intelligence Agency
Jonna Hiestand Mendez, Technical Operations Officer, Central Intelligence Agency
Emile Nakhleh, Former Director of the Political Islam Strategic Analysis Program, Central Intelligence Agency
Gerald A. O’Shea, Senior Operations Officer, Central Intelligence Agency
David Priess, Former Analyst and Manager, Central Intelligence Agency
Pam Purcilly, Former Deputy Director of Analysis, Central Intelligence Agency
Marc Polymeropoulos, Former Senior Operations Officer, Central Intelligence Agency
Chris Savos, Former Senior Intelligence Officer, Central Intelligence Officer
Nick Shapiro, Former Deputy Chief of Staff and Senior Advisor to the Director, Central Intelligence Agency
John Sipher, Former Senior Operations Officer, Central Intelligence Agency
Stephen Slick, Former Senior Director for Intelligence Programs, National Security Council
Cynthia Strand, Former Deputy Assistant Director for Global Issues, Central Intelligence Agency
Greg Tarbell, Former Deputy Executive Director, Central Intelligence Agency
David Terry, Former Chairman of the National Intelligence Collection Board
Greg Treverton, Former Chair, National Intelligence Council
John Tullius, Former Senior Intelligence Officer, Central Intelligence Agency
David A. Vanell, Former Senior Operations Officer, Central Intelligence Agency
Winston Wiley, Former Director of Analysis, Central Intelligence Agency
Kristin Wood, Former Senior Intelligence Officer, Central Intelligence Agency.
Hunter Biden Laptop Contains Multiple Department Of Defense ‘Encryption Keys’ With Twenty Plus Year Expiration Dates To Allow Holder Access To DoD Databases
CDMedia has confirmed the Hunter Biden infamous ‘laptop from Hell’ contains many U.S. Department of Defense ‘root encryption certificates’, or encryption keys to DoD databases. The keys have unusual long-term expiration dates, with many lasting twenty years or more.
This information was discovered during a deep forensic investigation done over the last couple weeks, by Jack Maxey and his team in Switzerland.
This situation raises multiple questions, such as…
Why did Hunter Biden have a large number of Department of Defense encryption codes to allow access to national security data?
Did Hunter Biden give anyone else access to this information?
Who gave the codes to Hunter Biden?
Why do the codes have long-term expiration dates, when the usual practice is to provide a user access only during his ‘need to know’, or time in the job, which is usually 2-3 years at most?
We have been informed the Department of Justice has been alerted to the situation.
We have also been informed the DoD has been told of the discovery.
Hunter Biden Laptop Claims: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know
A computer repair shop owner in Delaware has thrust claims about a purported Hunter Biden laptop into the presidential race.
The claims, coming as an October surprise of sorts in the presidential election, have generated heated controversy. Major social media platforms dialed back their reach, provoking criticism from conservatives. Others have criticized the New York Post, which originated the story, and it's verification methods.
The Post claims that the laptop contains emails indicating otherwise, and that its hard drive also contained photos, including a picture of Hunter purportedly smoking crack. He has a well-known drug addiction.
What's the story of Hunter Biden's alleged laptop?
Here's what you need to know:
1. John Paul Mac Isaac, a Trump Supporter, Brought Forward the Laptop Claims
The issue burst into the public eye when The New York Post ran the story that alleged Hunter Biden, Joe's son, dropped off a damaged MacBook laptop at a Delaware computer store to be repaired, and emails and photos were discovered on it, some involving his father.
The pathway to the public went through President Donald Trump's key supporter, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani. The Post alleged that the computer store owner, John Paul Mac Isaac, "made a copy of the hard drive and later gave it to former Mayor Rudy Giuliani's lawyer, Robert Costello."
Some have raised questions about the Post story's credibility. The New York Timesreported that the Post's "front-page article about Hunter Biden … was written mostly by a staff reporter who refused to put his name on it … because he had concerns over the article's credibility." Unidentified Post employees who spoke to The Times said "many" staff members had concerns about the story's sources, the timing and "whether the paper had done enough to verify the authenticity of the hard drive's contents."
The Post article was headlined, "Smoking-gun email reveals how Hunter Biden introduced Ukrainian businessman to VP dad."
Conservatives have argued on social media that the news media should focus on trying to prove or disprove the claims.
The Post explained that "Steve Bannon, former adviser to President Trump, told The Post about the existence of the hard drive in late September and Giuliani provided The Post with a copy of it."
2. The Laptop Contains Emails That People Allege Show Joe Biden Was Involved With an Ukrainian Energy Firm Executive
The Post's central claim of wrongdoing against the elder Biden derives from alleged emails on the laptop.
The alleged smoking-gun email The Post claims was on the computer in question shows Hunter Biden setting up a meeting between his father and a Ukrainian energy firm executive. Hunter Biden was paid by the firm.
The story alleged, "Hunter Biden introduced his father, then-Vice President Joe Biden, to a top executive at a Ukrainian energy firm less than a year before the elder Biden pressured government officials in Ukraine into firing a prosecutor who was investigating the company, according to emails obtained by The Post." The prosecutor in question was Viktor Shokin, who was planning to investigate Burisma, and Biden put pressure on Ukraine to fire him or U.S. aid to the country would be withheld, The Post reported.
"Dear Hunter, thank you for inviting me to DC and giving an opportunity to meet your father and spent some time together. It's realty an honor and pleasure," the email, purportedly from Vadym Pozharskyi and found on the mysterious laptop in question, reads. The Post also alleged the laptop contained sexually explicit photos. An FBI spokesperson told the Post: "My office can neither confirm nor deny the existence of an investigation." Pozharskyi advised the Burisma board which paid Hunter $50,000 a month.
The Biden campaign has denied there was a meeting between Joe Biden and the energy executive.
Hunter Biden's lawyer told NBC News the meeting did not happen but stopped short of saying the computer did not belong to Hunter, saying, "We have no idea where this came from, and certainly cannot credit anything that Rudy Giuliani provided to the New York Post, but what I do know for certain is that this purported meeting never happened."
The Biden campaign trashed Giuliani's credibility and denied the meeting but also did not dispute the laptop was Hunter's, telling NBC News, "The New York Post never asked the Biden campaign about the critical elements of this story. They certainly never raised that Rudy Giuliani — whose discredited conspiracy theories and alliance with figures connected to Russian intelligence have been widely reported — claimed to have such materials. We have reviewed Joe Biden's official schedules from the time and no meeting, as alleged by the New York Post, ever took place."
According to NPR, which wrote a story raising questions about the Post's reporting: "To start, the emails have not been verified as authentic. They were said to have been extracted from a computer assumed — but not proven — to have belonged to the younger Biden." NPR reported that there's no documentation that the meeting occurred and added that "the lead reporter was a former producer for Sean Hannity," who is a Trump supporter. Rupert Murdoch, who owns the Post, has been a Trump supporter at times, although he's raised questions about whether Trump will win and has had falling outs with the president.
According to Fox News, President Trump is planning to bring Tony Bobulinski, a retired Navy lieutenant and "former Hunter Biden associate" to the debate on October 22 as his guest. Bobulinski was the CEO of Sinohawk Holdings, which "was a partnership between the Chinese operating through CEFC/Chairman Ye and the Biden family."
The Hill reported that Bobulinski's "emails were a key part of a story published recently by the New York Post, alleging that Hunter Biden used his influence to connect a Ukrainian businessman and fellow board member at the gas company Burisma with his father when he was vice president."
That email alleged "a business arrangement involving a Chinese company and members of the Biden family," including a note reading "Hunter has some office expectations he will elaborate," Fox News reported, adding that there was a "proposed equity split" referencing "20" for "H" and "10 held by H for the big guy?"
"The reference to ‘the Big Guy' in the much publicized May 13, 2017 email is in fact a reference to Joe Biden," Bobulinski said in a statement to Fox News.
Bobulinski told Fox News that "he does not believe Joe Biden's past claim that he did not discuss his son Hunter's business affairs with him," alleging that Hunter "frequently referenced asking him for his sign-off or advice on various potential deals."
"The Biden family aggressively leveraged the Biden family name to make millions of dollars from foreign entities even though some were from communist-controlled China," he told Fox News, adding, "Hunter wanted to use the company as his personal piggy bank by just taking money out of it as soon as it came from the Chinese."
The Hill also published this purported texting exchange between Bobulinski and Hunter Biden on May 2, 2017:
"Mrng plse let me knw if we will do early dinner w your Uncle & dad and where, also for document translation do you want it simple Chinese or traditional?" – Bobulinski to Hunter Biden.
"Not sure on dinner yet and whatever is the most common for a Chinese legal DOC" – Hunter replied. "Chinese legal docs can be both, i'll make it traditional," Bobulinski said.
3. An FBI Agent's Signature May Appear on a Subpoena That Could Relate to the Laptop
One angle that has emerged about the purported Hunter Biden laptop: The name of an FBI agent, Joshua Wilson, may appear on a subpoena produced by the Delaware computer store owner. He says the subpoena related to a 2019 grand jury appearance about the laptop.
However, Fox News is now reporting that the laptop was subpoenaed as part of a "money laundering" probe.
Who is Joshua Wilson? There is an FBI agent named Joshua Wilson who has been assigned to child pornography and abduction cases over the years. A sitting senator, Ron Johnson (R-Wisconsin), went on Fox News and speculated about what that mean for Hunter Biden. To be clear, though, it hasn't been definitively proven that the laptop belonged to Hunter Biden; it also hasn't been definitively proven that the subpoena relates to that laptop.
Business Insider reported that the name on the back page of the subpoena appears to say Joshua Wilson and refer to the Wilmington Office.
Although the Joshua Wilson who works for the FBI has worked on child pornography cases over the years, Mac Isaac stated he "did not see child pornography" on the laptop in question, according to Business Insider.
The Post alleged, "Photos of a Delaware federal subpoena given to The Post show that both the computer and hard drive were seized by the FBI in December after the shop's owner says he alerted the feds to their existence."
4. Some Have Accused the Computer Repair Shop Owner of Contradictions & Others Claim Photoshop Might Have Been Used on the Photos; Yet Others Think It's a Double Standard
The computer repair shop owner has granted interviews that raised more questions.
He says he didn't actually see Hunter Biden drop off the laptop, which had a Beau Biden Foundation sticker on it. The Daily Beast reported that Mac Isaac gave conflicting statements about the laptop, including about the FBI contact with him, saying that the FBI contacted him but saying another time that he contacted the FBI.
According to the Daily Beast, which conducted an extensive interview with Mac Isaac, he "appeared not to have a grasp on the timeline of the laptop arriving at his shop and its disappearance from it." A Trump supporter who voted for the president in 2016, he referred to the impeachment as a "sham," Daily Beast reported. He blamed an undefined medical condition for not seeing who actually dropped off the laptop. He seemed nervous and expressed fears for his life, Daily Beast reported.
The Post story also contained photos purportedly of Hunter Biden.
Some people claim a Photoshop clone tool was used on at least one picture.
Today's bogus October Surprise is brought to you by Murdoch-owned tabloid @nypost on behalf of the Trump campaign's very own @RudyGiuliani.
I will share hilariously bad bits and research, both mine and others, debunking Giuliani's pet disinfo campaign throughout the day. pic.twitter.com/krMsTMnYEN
On Fox Across America with Jimmy Failla, Rep. Andy Biggs (R-AZ) said he believed the media are showing a double standard with how they're reporting on the laptop.
"I want you to just imagine if the shoe was on the other foot, if somehow there was a Trump kid who had left their laptop somewhere that was full of incriminating evidence and their former business partner, like Biden's former business partner, is standing out there saying we were making money hand over fist, this was designed to get into the Biden family," he said. "The ‘big guy' that's supposed to get $10M, that is Joe Biden. I mean, when you have all this kind of evidence, they went through an impeachment here when they couldn't even decide if there was a crime, a high crime to misdemeanor. And they just dismantles and created this discord in this country, and they won't even cover this story."
National Public Radio's public editor, Kelly McBride, explained NPR's coverage of the Hunter Biden laptop claims by sharing this quote:
"We don't want to waste our time on stories that are not really stories, and we don't want to waste the listeners' and readers' time on stories that are just pure distractions," NPR Managing Editor for News Terence Samuel said. "And quite frankly, that's where we ended up, this was … a politically driven event and we decided to treat it that way."
Kelly McBride wrote, "There are many, many red flags in that New York Post investigation. NPR Media Correspondent David Folkenflik detailed most of them here. Intelligence officials warn that Russia has been working overtime to keep the story of Hunter Biden in the spotlight. Even if Russia can't be positively connected to this information, the story of how Trump associates Steve Bannon and Rudy Giuliani came into a copy of this computer hard drive has not been verified and seems suspect. And if that story could be verified, the NY Post did no forensic work to convince consumers that the emails and photos that are the basis for their report have not been altered."
McBride added: "The handful of stories that NPR has produced about the NY Post investigation have been limited to how Facebook and Twitter are restricting distribution of the story or how families of those seeking treatment for addiction are impacted by the portrayal of Hunter Biden's struggle."
5. Some Say the Laptop Might Be a Russian Disinformation Campaign But the Director of National Intelligence Disputes That Claim
Complicating matters further, USA Today has reported that the FBI is investigating whether the Post story on the laptop is a disinformation campaign by Russia.
However, Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe said there was "no intelligence to support" claims that the laptop involves a Russian disinformation campaign, according to CNN, which added that an FBI official wrote Congress, "we have nothing to add at this time to the October 19th public statement by the Director of National Intelligence about the available actionable intelligence."
According to The Hill, Biden campaign manager Kate Bedingfield said that Trump would be "amplifying Russian disinformation" if he brings it up the laptop during the presidential debate.
"If we see tonight from Donald Trump these attacks on Vice President Biden's family, I think we need to be very, very clear that what he's doing here is amplifying Russia disinformation," Bedingfield said to the publication.
NBC News reported that the FBI is now investigating whether the laptop emails "are linked to a foreign intelligence operation." NBC reported that it had confirmed that the FBI had seized the laptop and held a grand jury relating to it.
