Senators demand FBI agents testify about 'highly credible' source who allegedly made up Biden bribery scheme

Posted 17 days ago

From WWW.FOXNEWS.COM

EXCLUSIVE: Republican Sens. Chuck Grassley and Ron Johnson are demanding the FBI make Alexander Smirnov’s handling agent and his superiors available for interviews as they investigate what steps the bureau and the Justice Department took to investigate the now-infamous FD-1023 form alleging a criminal bribery scheme involving Joe Biden and Ukraine.

Fox News Digital obtained a letter Grassley, R-Iowa, and Johnson, R-Wis., sent to Attorney General Merrick Garland, FBI Director Christopher Wray and Special Counsel David Weiss late Tuesday.

"Since October 13, 2022, Congress has requested from the Justice Department and FBI information and records relating to the FD-1023 to better understand what steps, if any, the Justice Department took to investigate the document," Grassley and Johnson wrote.

Grassley was approached by a whistleblower in 2022 who alleged the FBI was in possession of a document — the FD-1023 — which dated back to 2020 and detailed a bribery scheme between Joe Biden, Hunter Biden and the top executive of Ukrainian natural gas firm Burisma Holdings.

An FD-1023 form is used by FBI agents to record unverified reporting from confidential human sources. The form is used to document information as told to an FBI agent, but recording that information does not validate or weigh it against other information known by the FBI.

The FD-1023 details claims from FBI confidential human source Alexander Smirnov who told the FBI in June 2020 about meetings he had with Burisma executives years prior, where they supposedly admitted that they hired Hunter Biden to sit on the board of the company to "protect us, through his dad, from all kinds of problems."

Hunter Biden sat on the board of Burisma while his father was vice president.

The FD-1023 document includes Smirnov’s claims that Burisma executives paid $5 million to Joe Biden and $5 million to Hunter Biden, while Joe Biden was still in office as vice president. Smirnov also claims that the Bidens were paid so that Joe Biden could help to quash criminal investigation into Burisma being conducted by then-Ukrainian Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin.

Shokin was eventually fired, which Joe Biden had publicly boasted about. Biden and allies have said that the firing of Shokin was in an effort to root out corruption in Ukraine. Joe Biden, at the time, ran U. S.-Ukraine policy.

Smirnov has since been indicted on charges of making false statements and creating a false and fictitious record relating to the Biden’s business ties in Ukraine. The charges stem from Special Counsel David Weiss’ investigation. Smirnov has pleaded not guilty and is expected to stand trial later this month.

"The federal indictment of Smirnov leaves many questions unanswered, including how the Justice Department and FBI could use this Confidential Human Source for approximately 14 years, pay him hundreds of thousands of dollars, use his information in investigations and prosecutions, and then ultimately determine he’s a liar," Grassley and Johnson wrote.

Grassley and Johnson also pointed out that the FBI "refused to confirm even the existence of the FD-1023" until May 2023, when Grassley and House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer notified Wray during a phone call that they had reviewed it.

During that call, Wray informed Grassley and Comer of "the importance of the Confidential Human Source (Smirnov) to the FBI’s investigative work."

"Indeed, in regard to that alleged credibility, the FBI informed the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability that the Confidential Human Source was ‘highly credible,’ trusted, and had worked for the FBI for years and had been paid ‘six figures,’" the letter states, adding that the "FBI further represented to Congress that information from the Confidential Human Source was used in criminal investigations and prosecutions."

Grassley and Johnson also pointed out testimony from top Justice Department officials, like then-U. S. Attorney Scott Brady, who said the FD-1023 and the confidential human source "was vetted against sources of Russian disinformation" and that DOJ officials "found that it was not sourced from Russian disinformation."... (Read more)






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