The FBI has maintained more than 40 confidential human sources on criminal matters that relate to the Biden family, including the current president, dating back to his time serving as vice president, according to information provided by GOP Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa.
The confidential human sources “provided criminal information to the FBI relating to Joe Biden, James Biden, and Hunter Biden.” Several FBI field offices nationwide managed the sources nationwide, including the FBI’s Seattle Field Office.
However, Grassley learned that an FBI task force within the Washington Field Office looked to successfully (in some cases) shut down information and reporting from those sources by falsely discrediting information as foreign disinformation. The effort “caused investigative activity to cease.”
Despite the efforts by the FBI task force, Grassley said in at least one instance, a confidential human source and its information was vetted by several U.S. attorneys’ offices and found “no hits to known sources of Russian disinformation.”
The disclosures were laid out in a letter Grassley wrote to FBI Director Christopher Wray and Attorney General Merrick Garland late Tuesday evening.
“Based on the information provided to my office over a period of years by multiple credible whistleblowers, there appears to be an effort within the Justice Department and FBI to shut down investigative activity relating to the Biden family,” wrote Grassley to Wray and Garland.
“Such decisions point to significant political bias infecting the decision-making of not only the Attorney General and FBI Director but also line agents and prosecutors,” Grassley continued. “Our Republic cannot survive such a political infection, and you have an obligation to this country to clear the air.”
Grassley has been investigating records, information, and allegations from multiple FBI and Justice Department whistleblowers that indicate “there is — and has been — an effort among certain Justice Department and FBI officials to improperly delay and stop full and complete investigative activity into the Biden family, including but not limited to FD-1023s referencing the Biden family.”
An FD-1023 is a form generated by the FBI and used to document confidential human source reporting.
“An essential question that must be answered is this: did the FBI investigate the information or shut it down?” wrote Grassley, noting that if those sources were “improperly shut down, it wouldn’t be out of the ordinary for the FBI.”
A confidential source alleged a criminal bribery scheme involving Biden
A critical FD-1023 report earlier this year included reporting from a “highly credible” confidential human source who alleged a criminal bribery scheme between Joe Biden — then vice president — his son Hunter Biden, and the CEO and founder of Ukrainian natural gas firm Burisma Holdings, Mykola Zlochevsky.
The form details several conversations and meetings the source had with a top executive of Burisma Holdings over several years, beginning in 2015. At the same time, Hunter Biden sat on the board of Burisma.
The source told the FBI that Hunter and Joe Biden allegedly “coerced” Zlochevsky to pay them millions of dollars in exchange for their help in getting Viktor Shokin, Ukrainian prosecutor investigating the company, fired. The White House continues to deny the allegations.
The form and allegations are “part of an ongoing investigative matter,” Grassley said, indicating “its investigative credibility and authenticity.”
In the letter sent to the FBI and DOJ late Tuesday, Grassley revealed in December 2019, the FBI Field Office in Washington closed a “205B” Kleptocracy case into Zlochevsky. The probe had been opened in January 2016 by a Foreign Corrupt Practices Act squad that included agents from FBI headquarters.
Several months later, in August of 2020, Brian Auten, Supervisory Intelligence Analyst, opened an assessment used by the Foreign Influence Task Force to search for confidential human source information at FBI field offices across the country related to the Biden family. Senator Grassley said he then worked to “falsely discredit them as foreign disinformation.”
The task force “attempted to shut down” the question of the investigative steps on the FD-1023, saying it “was subject to foreign disinformation.”
“It should be emphasized that the basis for trying to shut down the Biden family 1023 has been described to my office as highly suspect and is contradicted by other documents my office has been told exist within the Foreign Influence Task Force, FBI Seattle Field Office FBI Baltimore Field Office, and FBI HQ holdings,” wrote Grassley.
During the same period, the task force traveled to Capitol Hill and “improperly briefed” Johnson and Grassley on their investigation into the Biden family after “pressure from congressional Democrats.”
“That improper briefing was used by Democrats and the partisan media to falsely claim our investigation, which was based on Obama/Biden administration records, was impacted by foreign disinformation,” wrote Grassley.
During an October 2020 call, it became clear that FBI agents in Delaware “were in possession of email evidence that contradicted denials made by Joe Biden that he was never aware of or involved in Hunter Biden’s business arrangements.”
Lesley Wolf, Assistant U.S. Attorney, was briefed in late October 2020 on the contents of the FD-1023 in question; however, Grassley said she “prevented investigators from seeking information about Joe Biden’s involvement in Hunter Biden’s criminal arrangements.” IRS whistleblowers have made the same allegation.
Grassley noted that in October 2020, an “avenue of derogatory Hunter Biden reporting was ordered closed” at the direction of Tim Thibault, Assistant Special Agent in Charge. The move was made, according to whistleblowers, “in furtherance of Auten’s assessment.”
Grassley said portions of Thibault’s interview with the House Judiciary Committee that were publicly released confirmed the allegations and revealed that an FBI headquarters and “Baltimore element wanted the Hunter Biden reporting closed, which Thibault followed through on.”
The FBI did not comment on Grassley’s letter.
Weeks after the 2020 presidential election, Johnson and Grassley made their final report about the probe public. They detailed their findings based on interviews, hundreds of Treasury Department Suspicious Activity Reports, and thousands of pages of government records dating back to the Obama administration.
“Our findings indicated potential criminal activity, to include money laundering, with respect to members of the Biden family and their business associates as well as strong financial connections to questionable foreign nationals and foreign government-linked corporate entities,” wrote Grassley.
Since then, Grassley has provided hundreds of pages of bank records “connecting the Biden family to Chinese-government-linked entities.”
Grassley demanded the DOJ and FBI answer his letter by November 17.
