The Republican Party ignored warnings and pushed now discredited allegations against Biden
In May 2023, Senator Charles E. Grassley, one of President Biden’s main antagonists, walked into the Senate with shocking news: He had, he said, learned of a document in the FBI’s possession that “could be a criminal scheme reveal where then – Vice President Biden.”
Mr. Grassley, a Republican from Iowa, suggested to all Americans listening that there was a single document that could corroborate the most sensational allegations of corruption against Mr. Biden — and that the Federal Bureau of Investigation was engaged in a cover-up.
“Did they sweep it under the rug to protect candidate Biden?” he asked conspiratorially.
In the months that followed, Mr. Grassley’s quest to make the accusation public — recorded in an obscure document known as FBI Form 1023 — became a fixation and a foundation of the growing Republican push to unseat Mr. Biden as revenge for the Democrats. ‘ treatment of former President Donald J. Trump.
At the center of it all was the baseless accusation that Mr. Biden took a $5 million bribe from the director of a 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 be cautious about the accusation because it was uncorroborated and its credibility unknown used to be.
All the form showed, federal law enforcement officials explained, was that a confidential source had said something and they had written it down. And now federal prosecutors say the claim is fabricated.
But the warnings Republicans received about the materials from the start did not stop them from repeating the unverified accusation hundreds of times over many months, in official settings and in interviews on right-wing media.
Representative James R. Comer, Republican of Kentucky and chairman of the Oversight Committee, called the source of the allegation “highly credible,” while Representative Jim Jordan, Republican of Ohio and chairman of the Judiciary Committee, called the form the “most corroborating evidence that we have.”
Representative Elise Stefanik of New York, the third-ranking Republican in the House of Representatives and one of Trump’s most outspoken allies in that chamber, called it “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, included it as a “key document” on the House Republicans’ impeachment inquiry website, and even threatened to hold FBI Director Christopher A. Wray in contempt when he resisted their calls to give them a non- send a redacted statement. copy of the form.
Last week, a federal grand jury in California indicted the former FBI informant who made the accusation, Alexander Smirnov, on charges that he fabricated the story in 2020 to help defeat Mr. Biden in the presidential campaign. Prosecutors also alleged in a lawsuit that Mr. Smirnov, a dual citizen of the United States and Israel who operated as a businessman and fixer in the former Soviet states, told federal investigators that “officials linked to Russian intelligence were involved” in the pass an unspecified story about Hunter Biden, the president’s son, who had been a Burisma board member.
Current and former law enforcement officials said confidential informants dissemble all the time — often to impress their handlers or to settle grudges — which is why releasing an unedited, unverified report from a single source is strictly prohibited.
In a series of sharp letters to Republicans in Congress last spring and summer, senior FBI officials explained why they were unwilling to show lawmakers the impeachment form, even in private.
“The mere existence of such a document would prove little beyond the fact that a confidential human source provided information and that the FBI captured it,” Christopher Dunham, the agency’s acting deputy director, wrote on May 10, 2023 .
“Indeed, 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 revealing the unsubstantiated claims would jeopardize other confidential sources and have a “chilling effect” on recruiting others.
But a few weeks later, after Republicans in the House of Representatives threatened to hold Mr. Wray in contempt of Congress for refusing to share the form, the agency reluctantly agreed to make a redacted copy available for public inspection. in a secure facility on Capitol Hill. And several Republicans who saw it ignored the agency’s warnings, describing its contents and citing it as proof positive that Mr. Biden was corrupt.
When news emerged last week that the Justice Department had accused Mr. Smirnov of making it all up, Republicans downplayed their earlier statements and blamed the FBI and Justice Department officials for telling them that the person who made the accusation was generally considered a credible source. (Both Democrats and Republicans agree that agency officials initially portrayed the source in Congress as “highly credible,” even though the allegations he made against Mr. Biden were unverified.)
“I’m sure they’re apologizing now,” Rep. Ken Buck, a Colorado Republican who has been skeptical of the impeachment move, said sarcastically of his colleagues. “I’m sure they’re saying, ‘Wow, Director Wray, you did the right thing. We greatly appreciate your professionalism. ”
Mr. Buck, a former prosecutor of 25 years, said the FBI had 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 start preaching how important this was without knowing the reliability of the testimony.”
Despite the bureau’s warnings and Republican investigators’ failure to provide evidence to support the bribery claims, members of the party’s right wing amplified their attacks and linked them to their impeachment inquiry.
Mr. Comer even chided reporters for calling the allegations “unverified” instead of reporting that the informant was “highly credible” after lawmakers were shown the form.
In the weeks that followed, Mr. Comer, Mr. Jordan, Senator Josh Hawley of Missouri and many others praised the allegations.
Perhaps no one went as far as Ms. Stefanik, who spoke on Fox News about what she characterized as the corruption scandal of the century.
“You have multiple members of the Biden family illegally benefiting from foreign governments,” Ms. Stefanik said. “You also have the bombshell reporting, including possible ties that exist, from when Joe Biden was vice president and took bribes from Burisma.” (It was not clear what she was referring to; the accusation made no mention of ties.)
And Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, Republican of Florida, said the document provided concrete evidence of what Republicans had suspected all along.
“This is definitely something Oversight has speculated on,” she said. But now, she added, “we have proof.”
Weeks later, Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia would 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 take $5 million in bribes, but so did Hunter Biden.”
That, she added, was sufficient reason to begin the impeachment of Mr. Biden.
“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 should 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 animus that drove Republicans to promote his claims.
During the 2020 campaign, he sent his FBI handler “a series of messages expressing bias” against Mr. Biden, including texts riddled with typos and misspellings, in which he bragged that he had information that would land him in prison.
In the wake of Mr. Smirnov’s indictment, Democrats have called for an end to the impeachment inquiry.
Representative Dan Goldman, a New York Democrat who was a federal prosecutor, said the FBI should never have released the 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 must be terminated immediately,” he said.
Instead of admitting that they overhyped the evidence, Republicans have turned around.
Despite his role in inciting the frenzy, Mr. Grassley’s office denied that Iowan had promoted the allegations, saying he was “merely asking what the FBI was doing to investigate and verify the allegations.”
Mr. Grassley’s spokeswoman also claimed a sliver of victory because, she said, the senator had forced the FBI to finally investigate the claim. “Given the timeline provided in the DOJ indictment, it is clear that the FBI did not begin investigating until after Senator Grassley made the 1023 public,” she said.
Mr. Comer now says the impeachment inquiry is “not dependent” on the form detailing the bribery allegation.
Mr. Jordan said Mr. Smirnov’s indictment “does not change the basic facts” of the case against Mr. Biden.
Republicans calm down a reference to the document is removed of a request to interview a witness in their impeachment inquiry.
And by Friday, the 1023 form had been removed from the impeachment inquiry section of the website called “Key Evidence.”
Kenneth P. Vogel reporting contributed. Zach Montague And Kitty Bennett research contributed.