Face the Nation moderator Margaret Brennan continued to push this narrative over the weekend, while NBC Senior Washington Correspondent Andrea Mitchell repeated the baseless accusation on the Today show.
However, officials quickly disputed this claim. On Monday, National Intelligence Director John Ratcliffe stated in no uncertain terms: “Hunter Biden's laptop is not part of some Russian disinformation campaign.”
He added: “This has nothing to do with the intelligence community or Russian disinformation. If it was, I would know that. So, to be clear, it's not.”
Some believe that Ratcliffe was compelled to say something after Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff of California presented the speculation as fact, telling Wolf Blitzer: “Clearly, the origins of this whole smear are from the Kremlin and the President is only too happy to have Kremlin help in trying to amplify it.”
However, Fox News senior political correspondent Mike Emanuel reported that his network had a photo of the computer repair receipt containing what appeared to be Hunter Biden’s signature as well as an email address and cell phone number for him. Meanwhile, documentation obtained from the FBI's interaction with the owner of the computer shop showed that the Bureau took possession of the laptop and external hard drive in December. In addition, media outlets like Fox News have been able to verify some of the emails.
Of course, it makes little sense that Russia had stolen all of the emails from the Ukrainian energy company Burisma as some suggested because the company would not have had correspondence between Hunter and a Chinese firm, nor would they have had the other salacious material that was found on the laptop.
Part of the Post’s story was about how Hunter Biden introduced his father, who was vice president at the time, to a top executive of Burisma. Hunter sat on the board of the company despite lacking experience and qualifications and took home $50,000 a month for the role.
The meeting took place just a year before Joe Biden pressured the president of Ukraine to fire a top Ukrainian prosecutor by threatening to withhold a loan guarantee from the U.S. of $1 billion during a trip to Kiev in December 2015. The prosecutor, Viktor Shokin, had specific plans in place to investigate Burisma as well as every member of its executive board, Hunter Biden included.
Joe Biden has said repeatedly that he has never been involved in his son’s dealings, with statements such as “I have never spoken to my son about his overseas business dealings. He has also repeatedly denied that either of them had a conflict of interest or engaged in wrongdoing related to Burisma, and his campaign says there is no record of any such meeting taking place.
However, an email from Burisma adviser Vadym Pozharskyi thanked Hunter for giving him the chance to meet with his father. The email was sent on April 17, 2015 and read:
“Dear Hunter, thank you for inviting me to DC and giving an opportunity to meet your father and spent [sic] some time together. It’s realty [sic] an honor and pleasure.”
Previous emails showed the same man asking Hunter how he could use his influence to help the company.
The computer also contained a raunchy video showing Hunter smoking crack cocaine while participating in a sex act with an unidentified woman, as well as other explicit images.
While it’s understandable that the left would want people to believe this story is completely false, there are just too many aspects that are corroborated by other evidence. They cannot prove the story is a lie because it isn’t, and that’s why they have to resort to tactics like having their Big Tech cronies suppress stories about the Biden family’s corruption.
Sources for this article include: