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Federal investigators knew in December 2019 that Hunter Biden’s laptop was “not tampered with in any way” and contained “reliable evidence,” but that they were “impeded” from accessing all available information, according to an IRS whistleblower who the investigation involved — nearly a year earlier former intelligence officials and Joe Biden himself stated it was part of a Russian disinformation campaign.
The House Ways and Means Committee on Thursday released testimony from two IRS whistleblowers who said officials from the Justice Department, FBI and IRS were interfering with the investigation of the tax evasion case against Hunter Biden. The whistleblowers said the decisions in the case appeared to have been influenced “by politics”.
HUNTER BIDEN INVESTIGATORS LIMITED QUESTIONS ON ‘DAD’, ‘BIG GUY’ DESPITE OBJECTION FROM FBI, IRS: CLOCK BLOGER
A whistleblower, Gary Shapley Jr., who was the supervisor of the investigation at the IRS, said decisions were made “at every stage” of the Hunter Biden investigation that “benefited the subject matter of the investigation.”
Shapley testified that the investigation, codenamed “Sportsman,” opened in November 2018 as an “offshoot” of an IRS investigation into a “foreign amateur online pornography platform.” Testimony released by the commission contained no further explanation of how the porn outlet and Biden were connected.
Hunter Biden disembarks Air Force One at Hancock Field Air National Guard Base in Syracuse, New York, U.S., February 4, 2023. (REUTERS/Elizabeth Frantz)
It was previously believed that the investigation was based in part on suspicious foreign transactions.
Nearly a year later, in October 2019, Shapely said the “FBI became aware that a repair shop had a laptop that allegedly belonged to Hunter Biden and that the laptop may contain evidence of a crime.”
“The FBI verified its authenticity in November 2019 by matching the device number to Hunter Biden’s Apple iCloud ID,” Shapely said. “When the FBI took possession of the device in December 2019, they informed the IRS that it likely contained evidence of tax crimes.”
The owner of the laptop repair shop, John Paul Mac Isaac, was subpoenaed to testify in U.S. District Court in Delaware in December 2019.
HUNTER BIDEN TAX PROBE STARTED AS ‘OFFSHOOT’ IRS INVESTIGATION OF AMATEUR PORN SHOP: Whistleblower
The FBI’s deed of ownership for the laptop, first obtained by Fox News Digital in 2020, had a “Case ID” section, which was filled in with a handwritten number: 272D-BA-3065729.
The number “272” is the FBI classification for money laundering, while “272D” refers to “Money Laundering, Unknown SUA (Specified Unlawful Activity) – White Collar Crime Program,” according to FBI documents. A government official described “272D” as “transnational or general”.
Shapely said the FBI verified the laptop’s authenticity, even though many Biden allies said it was Russian disinformation.
It was in October 2020 that Shapley said he emailed assistant attorney Lesley Wolf saying, “We need to talk about the computer.”
Shapley said the FBI “appeared to have made certain statements about the device, and the only reason we know what’s on the device is because of the IRS CI-affiliated search warrant that allowed access to the documents.”
“My management needs to be looped into whatever the FBI is doing with the laptop,” Shapley said in an Oct. 19, 2020 email to Wolf. “It is the responsibility of IRS CI to know what is happening. Let me know when I can be briefed on this matter.”
President Biden snapped at reporters asking him about alleged corruption involving him and his son, Hunter Biden. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)
Shapley said his email led to “a special meeting” on Oct. 22, 2020, with the FBI’s prosecution team and computer analysis team to discuss Hunter Biden’s laptop.
“We objected again that we still hadn’t been allowed access to the laptop,” Shapley said, pointing out that Wolf admitted she hadn’t seen the laptop because “prosecutors decided to withhold it from investigators.”
“This decision is unprecedented in my experience,” Shapley said. “Investigators assigned to this study were not given access to all available evidence.”
Shapley further testified that it is “unknown whether all of the evidence on the laptop was reviewed by officers or prosecutors.”
Shapley had testified that Wolf had worked to “limit” questions about Joe Biden — calling him “father” or “the big man.”
Regarding the laptop, Shapley said that “based on prosecutors’ recurring guidelines not to investigate anything related to President Biden, there is no way to know if there was evidence of other criminal activity related to Hunter Biden or President Biden. .”
As for the contents of the laptop, Shapley said Wolf “acknowledged there was no reason to believe that data had been tampered with on devices by a third party.”
“She further supported this belief by stating that they corroborated the data with other sources of information received,” Shapley testified.
DOJ, FBI, IRS KEEP THE HUNTER BIDEN PROBE, ACCORDING TO A CLOCKBLOGER TESTIMONIAL ISSUED BY GOP
But despite confirmation, 51 former national security officials wrote a public letter just weeks before the 2020 election claiming that the Hunter Biden laptop had “all the classic hallmarks of a Russian intelligence operation.” It was signed by former President Obama CIA Director John Brennan, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, and former CIA Director and Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, among others.
Fox News Digital reported last month that former CIA deputy director Michael Morell worked to write the letter and gain support from ex-intelligence officials. Morell sent a draft of the statement to the CIA’s Prepublication Classification Review Board (PCRB) before making it public.
Morell emailed the draft to the PCRB, writing on October 19, 2020, “This is a rush job as it needs to be out the door ASAP.”
CIA ‘MAY HELPS GET SIGNERS’ FOR LETTER DISCREDITING HUNTER BIDEN LAPTOP: HOUSE GOP REPORT
Morell told the House Judiciary and Intelligence Committees that the PCRB “approved” the letter “as written” the same day.
Morell also said it was the Biden campaign that orchestrated the letter to discredit stories about Hunter Biden’s laptop — specifically current Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
Three days after the letter was made public, then-presidential nominee Joe Biden used it as a talking point in the final presidential debate of 2020 to counter the criticisms of then-President Donald Trump.
“There are 50 former national intelligence people who said what he is accusing me of is a Russian scheme,” Biden said during the debate.
BIDEN CAMPAIGN, EXCELLENT ORCHESTRATED INTEL LETTER TO DISCREDIT HUNTER BIDEN LAPTOP STORY, EX-CIA OFFICIALS SAYS
At the time, then-Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe said Hunter Biden’s laptop was not part of a Russian disinformation campaign. The FBI agreed.
These revelations come just days after the Justice Department announced that Hunter Biden will plead guilty to two counts of willful failure to pay federal income taxes as part of a deal expected to keep him out of jail. The president’s son also agreed to enter into a preliminary diversion agreement regarding a separate charge of possession of a firearm by a person who is an unlawful user of or addicted to a controlled substance.
HUNTER BIDEN WILL APPEAR IN FIRST COURT IN JULY ON FEDERAL TAX CHARGES
In response to the whistleblower allegations, the Justice Department said in a statement: “As both the Attorney General and U.S. Attorney David Weiss have said, U.S. Attorney Weiss has full authority over this matter, including the responsibility to decide where, when and whether to file charges as he sees fit. He does not require further approval to do so. Questions regarding his investigation should be directed to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for Delaware.”
Brooke Singman is a digital political reporter for Fox News. You can reach her at [email protected] or @BrookeSingman on Twitter.
