In May 2023, Senator Charles E. Grassley, a primary opponent of President Biden, entered the Senate with shocking news: He had learned, he said, of a document in the possession of the FBI that revealed “a criminal scheme that was involved at the time , could reveal.” -Vice President Biden.”
Mr. Grassley, a Republican from Iowa, suggested to all listening Americans that there was a single document that could confirm the most high-profile corruption allegations against Mr. Biden — and that the Federal Bureau of Investigation was conducting a cover-up.
“Did they sweep it under the rug to protect candidate Biden?” he asked conspiratorially.
Over the next few months, Mr. Grassley’s push to make the allegations public — laid out in an obscure document called FBI Form 1023 — became a fixation and a basis for the growing push by Republicans to impeach Mr. Biden in retaliation for Democrats ‘Treatment of former President Donald J. Trump.
At the center was the baseless accusation that Mr. Biden accepted a $5 million bribe from the chief executive of Ukrainian energy company Burisma.
But what neither Mr. Grassley nor any of the other Republicans who amplified the claims said in their breathless statements was that FBI officials had repeatedly warned them to tread carefully with the allegation because it was uncorroborated and its credibility unknown.
The form simply proves that a confidential source said something and they wrote it down, federal police officials said. And now federal prosecutors say the claim is fabricated.
But the warnings Republicans received from the start about the materials did not stop them from repeating the unverified claim hundreds of times over many months in official events and in right-wing media interviews.
Rep. James R. Comer, Republican of Kentucky and chairman of the Oversight Committee, called the source of the claim “highly credible,” while Rep. Jim Jordan, Republican of Ohio and chairman of the Judiciary Committee, called the form the “most corroborating evidence we have.” “have designated.”
Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York, the No. 3 Republican in the House of Representatives and one of Mr. Trump’s most vocal allies in that chamber, said it was “the biggest political corruption scandal, not just in my lifetime, but I would say in the last.” 100 years.” .”
Republicans read it into the congressional record, added it as a “key document” to the Republican impeachment website, and even threatened to hold FBI Director Christopher A. Wray in contempt when he resisted their demands to give them an unredacted document Copy of the form to be sent.
Last week, a federal grand jury in California indicted the former FBI informant who made the allegation, Alexander Smirnov, alleging that he fabricated the story in 2020 to defeat Mr. Biden in the presidential race. Prosecutors also alleged in a court filing that Mr. Smirnov, a dual citizen of the United States and Israel who worked as a businessman and fixer in the former Soviet states, told federal investigators in passing that “officials associated with Russian intelligence “, in passing, an unspecified story was involved about Hunter Biden, the president’s son, who had been a board member of Burisma.
Current and former law enforcement officials said confidential informants constantly dissemble – often to impress their superiors or address their grudges – which is why releasing a raw, uncorroborated report from a single source is strictly prohibited.
In a series of targeted letters to Republicans in Congress last spring and summer, senior FBI officials explained why they were unwilling to show the allegations form to lawmakers, even in private.
“The mere existence of such a document would prove little beyond the fact that a confidential human source provided information and the FBI recorded it,” Christopher Dunham, the agency’s acting deputy director, wrote on May 10, 2023.
“In fact, the FBI regularly receives information from sources with significant potential biases, motivations and knowledge, including drug traffickers, members of organized crime or even terrorists,” he added.
In another letter, Mr. Dunham warned Mr. Comer that disclosing the unfounded allegations would jeopardize other confidential sources and have a “chilling effect” on recruiting others.
But a few weeks later, after House Republicans threatened to hold Mr. Wray in contempt of Congress for refusing to turn over the form, the office reluctantly agreed to release a redacted copy for viewing at a secure facility at the Capitol Hill to provide. And several of the Republicans who saw it ignored the office’s warnings by describing its contents and citing them as evidence that Mr. Biden was corrupt.
When news broke last week that the Justice Department had accused Mr. Smirnow of making the whole thing up, Republicans downplayed their earlier statements and accused FBI and Justice Department officials of telling them that the person who made the allegations was generally regarded as a credible source. (Both Democrats and Republicans agree that bureau officials initially portrayed the source to Congress as “highly credible,” even though the allegations he made against Mr. Biden had not been confirmed.)
“I’m sure they’re apologizing now,” Rep. Ken Buck, a Colorado Republican who has been skeptical of the impeachment effort, said sarcastically of his colleagues. “I’m sure they’ll say, ‘Wow, Director Wray, you did the right thing.’ We really appreciate your professionalism.’”
Mr. Buck, a former prosecutor for 25 years, said the FBI handled the allegation as any professional law enforcement agency should.
“You don’t run to the press every time a witness says something because you don’t know how reliable that testimony is,” Mr. Buck said. “It was premature to extol the significance of this statement without knowing the credibility of the statement.”
Despite the FBI’s warnings and the inability of Republican investigators to provide evidence to support the bribery allegations, members of the party’s right wing stepped up their attacks and tied them to their impeachment inquiry.
Mr. Comer even chided reporters for calling the allegations “unverified” instead of reporting that the whistleblower was “highly credible” after the form was presented to lawmakers.
In the weeks that followed, Mr. Comer, Mr. Jordan, Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri and many others voiced the allegations.
Perhaps no one went as far as Ms. Stefanik, who spoke on Fox News about what she called the corruption scandal of the century.
“There are several members of the Biden family who are illegally profiting from foreign governments,” Ms. Stefanik said. “You also have the bombshell reporting, including potentially existing tapes, of how Joe Biden accepted a bribe from Burisma as vice president.”
And Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, Republican of Florida, said the document provides concrete evidence of what Republicans have always suspected.
“This is absolutely something that Oversight has speculated about,” she said. But now, she added, “we have proof.”
Weeks later, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia read the allegations into the congressional record: “This form contains the damning information that then-Vice President Joe Biden accepted a $5 million bribe from the oligarch who owns Burisma.” Not only did Joe Biden accept a $5 million bribe, but so did Hunter Biden.”
This is reason enough to initiate the impeachment of Mr. Biden, she added.
“What I am demanding is that the Republican-led House of Representatives move forward with an impeachment inquiry against Joe Biden because this type of corruption must never be allowed to continue,” she said.
The indictment unsealed in California federal court portrays Mr. Smirnov as a serial liar whose motivation for targeting the Bidens appeared to be rooted in the same political animosity that drove Republicans to promote his claims.
During the 2020 campaign, he sent his FBI handler “a series of messages expressing his bias” against Mr. Biden, including texts full of typos and misspellings in which he boasted that he had information that would implicate him would bring prison.
After Mr. Smirnov’s indictment, Democrats have called for an end to the impeachment inquiry.
Representative Dan Goldman, a New York Democrat and federal prosecutor, said the FBI should never have released Form 1023.
“It is truly a dereliction of duty as an investigator to do what they did, and that is another reason why this investigation should be stopped immediately,” he said.
Instead of admitting that they overstated the evidence, Republicans changed course.
Despite his role in sparking the furore, Mr. Grassley’s office denied that the Iowan promoted the allegations, saying he “only ever asked what the FBI did to investigate and verify the allegations.”
Mr. Grassley’s spokeswoman also claimed a small victory because the senator had forced the FBI to finally investigate the claim. “Given the timeline outlined in the DOJ indictment, it is clear that the FBI only began investigating after Senator Grassley made the 1023 public,” she said.
Mr. Comer now says the impeachment inquiry “does not rely on the form” detailing the bribery allegation.
Mr. Jordan said the indictment of Mr. Smirnov “does not change the basic facts” of the case against Mr. Biden.
Republicans quietly removed a reference to the document from a request to interview a witness as part of their impeachment inquiry.
And as of Friday, Form 1023 had been removed from the Key Evidence section of the impeachment inquiry website.
Kenneth P. Vogel contributed reporting. Zach Montague and Kitty Bennett contributed to the research.
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2024-02-24 14:43:38
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