The House investigation into an alleged bribery scheme involving Joe Biden (then the vice president) heated up on Monday after the FBI briefed oversight committee members on the allegations. According to Rep. James Comer, they were shown the FD-1023 which includes testimony from a “highly credible” confidential informant. Comer also shared that the document is currently being used in an “ongoing investigation.”
For its part, the FBI once again refused to hand over the document, and hearings are scheduled for Thursday on whether to hold FBI Director Christopher Wray in contempt of Congress for ignoring the subpoena.
As to the Democrat response, Rep. Jamie Raskin took to the podium after Comer and claimed that the investigation surrounding the FD-1023 had been “terminated” under former AG Bill Barr because it lacked any grounds (The Federalist).
Jamie Raskin dismisses James Comer's investigation into Hunter Biden:
"The FBI, Department of Justice team under Barr and Brady terminated the investigation. They said there were no grounds for further investigative steps." pic.twitter.com/2W8HPd9ELJ
— Citizen Free Press (@CitizenFreePres) June 5, 2023
“What I learned,” Raskin claimed, “was that Attorney General Barr named Scott Brady, who was the U.S. attorney for Western Pennsylvania, to head up a group of prosecutors who would look into all the allegations related to Ukraine.”
“After Rudy Giuliani surfaced these allegations,” Raskin continued, Brady’s team looked into the FD-1023 and “in August determined that there was no grounds to escalate from an initial assessment to a preliminary investigation,” and so “they called an end to the investigation.”
The contradiction was immediately apparent. How could the investigation be shut down if, as Comer said, the FBI said it was still ongoing? Who was telling the truth?
It didn’t take long to get an answer. Barr is now speaking out, and he has confirmed that Raskin is lying. Not only is he misleading people about Barr and Scott Brady shuttering the investigation, but the former AG also revealed that sufficient grounds existed to hand it off to the prosecutor in Delaware (where jurisdiction would reside).
“It’s not true. It wasn’t closed down,” William Barr told The Federalist on Tuesday in response to Democrat Rep. Jamie Raskin’s claim that the former attorney general and his “handpicked prosecutor” had ended an investigation into a confidential human source’s allegation that Joe Biden had agreed to a $5 million bribe. “On the contrary,” Barr stressed, “it was sent to Delaware for further investigation.”
It is unclear whether Raskin was fed the false information that he repeated several times (including in a later press release) or if he made it up himself. What is clear is that his tactics resemble those of Rep. Adam Schiff, the California congressman who was notorious for lying about the Russian collusion investigation.
Raskin repeated another falsehood as well during his presser. Specifically, he claimed that the FD-1023 was related to claims made by Rudy Guiliani. That isn’t true per sources who told The Federalist that the Biden bribery allegation is completely unrelated and was not brought by the Donald Trump acolyte.
Regardless, it is unfortunate that Barr handed off the investigation to the US Attorney in Delaware, as that’s the same office that has stalled on prosecuting Hunter Biden. It will be up to House Republicans to keep pushing on all these issues, including exposing whether or not Biden accepted $5 million worth of bribes for political interventions. The DOJ is not going to offer any assistance under the current regime.
Lying to cover up the truth. Raskin is one of the biggest liars amongst the lying brigade.