The contents on the laptop of President Biden’s son Hunter Biden were authenticated by mainstream outlets recently, but two Democratic leaders still say it’s Russian disinformation.
Hunter Biden, who is currently under federal investigation related to his taxes, abandoned his laptop at a Delaware computer repair shop before the 2020 presidential election.
The shop owner turned it over to the FBI but passed a copy of the hard drive to former New York City Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, who in turn gave a copy to the New York Post.
The drive’s contents, including evidence of shady international financial dealings involving Hunter Biden, prompted a series of articles in the New York Post about two weeks before the 2020 presidential election.
Democrats at the time dismissed the Post’s reporting as Russian disinformation. The evidence is now being reevaluated after left-leaning news outlets, including The New York Times and The Washington Post, recently confirmed the authenticity of incriminating emails and records found on the device.
Some Democrats, however, remain unconvinced and still claim the information is part of a Russian plot.
“I think it’s as bogus as it was before,” House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer told The Washington Times when asked if he thought the laptop and its contents constituted a Russian plot.
The Maryland Democrat added that he thought former President Donald Trump’s “appeal to Russian President Vladimir Putin to “find information about Biden is despicable.”
During an interview with JustTheNews Tuesday, Mr. Trump repeated an unverified claim that Hunter Biden obtained a $3.5 million payment through his firm, Rosemont Seneca Thornton LLC in 2014, from Elena Baturina, the ex-mayor of Moscow’s former wife.
Rep. David Cicilline of Rhode Island, chairman of the Democratic Policy and Communications Committee, told The Times he viewed the contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop now no differently than he did in 2020.
Four days after the original New York Post report on the laptop appeared on Oct. 14, 2020, Mr. Cicilline quote tweeted a New York Times reporter downplaying the explosive story: “NEW: A reporter on the New York Post’s Hunter Biden story refused to attach his byline to it, sources say, as the tabloid’s staff question the article’s credibility.”
The Rhode Island Democrat commented, “Oh look. The New York Post’s attempt to smear the Bidens is already collapsing in on itself. Shocker.”
Sen. Gary Peters, Michigan Democrat and chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, said he had not reviewed the new banking information about the younger Biden’s business dealings with the communist Chinese regime recently released by Sen. Ron Johnson, Wisconsin Republican and member of the committee.
Mr. Peters, who has previously clashed with Mr. Johnson over the Republican’s investigative work on Hunter Biden, told The Washington Times, “Well, I know the intelligence community said there was a lot of Russian misinformation out there.”
• Kerry Picket can be reached at kpicket@washingtontimes.com.
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