LAS VEGAS – former FBI informant It is claimed that he has connections with Russian intelligence officials gave false information to the bureau During the 2020 presidential campaign, President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter Biden, were released on parole after a detention hearing Tuesday in a federal courtroom in Las Vegas.
Alexander SmirnovA 43-year-old man who has worked as a confidential FBI source since 2010 said that “officials with ties to Russian intelligence” were involved in passing the story about Hunter Biden, prosecutors said. giving It claimed on Tuesday that Smirnov “actively peddled new lies that could affect the US election after meeting with Russian intelligence officials in November.”
U.S. Magistrate Judge Daniel J. Albregts found that the government had not made a case that Smirnov should be held pending trial and ordered his release, including GPS monitoring.
Smirnov was arrested last week in Las Vegas after returning on an international flight and faces two counts of lying to an FBI agent. His defenders say he is an American citizen who holds an Israeli passport, which Albregts ordered him to surrender.
Smirnov, according to prosecutors with the office of special counsel David Weiss, “provided false incriminating information to the FBI” about the Bidens, including falsely claiming that officials of Burisma, the Ukrainian energy company that employed Hunter Biden, paid the Bidens $5 million. each, and it will take investigators 10 years to find the fraudulent payments.
Smirnov’s claims a A major part of the Republican impeachment inquiry against Joe Biden, with GOP leaders repeatedly citing the unverified claims of a confidential FBI human source. Rep. Jim Jordan, chairman of the Ohio Judiciary Committee, who helped lead the GOP impeachment effort, said several weeks ago that Smirnov’s now-rebutted allegations were “the most corroborating evidence” Republicans have obtained in the ongoing impeachment inquiry.
House Republicans spent the day downplaying the indictment’s impact on the impeachment inquiry, said House Oversight Committee Chairman R-Ky. There was Comer threatened holding the FBI director in contempt over the summer, eventually persuading the bureau to do so to show Oversight Committee members said it was “Form FD-1023” documenting Smirnov’s alleged false statements to an FBI administrator in 2020, although the bureau stressed at the time that the existence of the form did not mean the claims had been verified. One of the Republicans who was quick to look at the form announced Joe Biden was “100% guilty” of bribery.
Smirnov’s attorneys, David Z. Chesnoff and Richard A. Schonfeld, said in a statement that they were “pleased to represent Mr. Smirnov” and that their client “is presumed innocent and should be released from prison so he can effectively fight the authorities.” of the government”.
Prosecutors in the retention letter he said Smirnov “has extensive foreign connections, including, most disturbingly and at his own expense, contacts with foreign intelligence services, including Russian intelligence agencies, and has had such contacts recently.”
In a court filing filed Tuesday by Hunter Biden Delaware criminal caseHunter Biden’s lawyers wrote that Smirnov’s lying “should have been obvious to everyone,” noting that the investigation into the lies was closed in August 2020, when then-President Donald Trump’s appointees led the Justice Department.
In a filing Tuesday, Hunter Biden’s attorneys questioned why Weiss’ office spent the last year reinvestigating Smirnov’s allegations.
“The special counsel accused Mr. Smirnov of lying and obstruction, but the more interesting part of this story is not that Mr. Smirnov lied,” Hunter Biden’s attorneys he wrote. “Beginning in July 2023, the Special Counsel’s team followed Mr. Smirnov down the rabbit hole of lies, which is even more remarkable.”
Fitzpatrick reported from Las Vegas. Reilly reported from Washington.