The top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee accused Chairman James Comer (R-KY) of misleading the public about a former FBI supervisory agent’s testimony on the federal investigation into President Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden.
Comer “cherry-picked and distorted statements of a witness to advance Republicans’ false narrative about political interference” with public declarations about the closed-door interview, said Ranking Member Jamie Raskin (D-MD).
Although Comer did not release any quotes, the chairman announced on Monday that the FBI veteran confirmed “key” aspects of whistleblower testimony by a pair of Internal Revenue Service agents who have come forward with claims that the Biden probe led by Delaware’s U.S. Attorney David Weiss had been slow-walked.
“The night before the interview of Hunter Biden, both Secret Service headquarters and the Biden transition team were tipped off about the planned interview” in early December 2020, Comer said. “On the day of the Hunter Biden interview, federal agents were told to stand by and could not approach Hunter Biden — they had to wait for his call. As a result of the change in plans, IRS and FBI criminal investigators never got to interview Hunter Biden as part of the investigation.”
Comer also shared a list of “key takeaways” regarding how the plan was allegedly foiled, after which the younger Biden announced to the world that he was under investigation.
House Oversight Committee interviews former FBI agent in Hunter Biden investigation. Learn that agents planned to interview Hunter on 12/8/20. It never happened. From the committee: https://t.co/bFkPh0djgz pic.twitter.com/KTBCdlhHyq
— Byron York (@ByronYork) July 18, 2023
In his rebuttal, Raskin said the former FBI supervisory agent from the bureau’s Wilmington office appeared voluntarily after being subpoenaed last week and testified that he “never knew the Assistant U.S. Attorneys in the office or U.S. Attorney Weiss to allow any political considerations to influence their prosecutorial decisions in any case.”
The former FBI agent acknowledged that it is “routine” for there to be disagreement between the FBI and Department of Justice in investigations and expressed an “understanding” that it is proper for prosecutors to make “additional considerations” beyond probable cause in determining whether to seek a warrant, Raskin said.
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“The supervisory special agent further pointed out that, in his experience, investigation targets who are attorneys, like Hunter Biden, rarely accept being interviewed by federal agents,” Raskin said.
“Further, although Republicans have tried to cast in harsh light the decision by FBI headquarters to alert the Secret Service of its intent to interview Hunter Biden, the FBI agent explained it was necessary to do so given Hunter Biden’s status as a protectee,” Raskin continued.
“The witness also provided that, while he was told a ‘transition team’ was also notified by FBI headquarters, he was not provided any actual details as to what transition team this referred to, and he did not know anything about whether they were actually notified,” Raskin added. “The witness also indicated he did not suspect any political purpose or improper motivation behind FBI headquarters’ putative decision in December 2020 to notify a ‘transition team’ and U.S. Secret Service headquarters prior to Hunter Biden’s interview.”
Raskin concluded his statement by calling on Comer to release the transcript.
A congressional source told The Daily Wire on Tuesday that the House Oversight Committee intends to do just that, but the transcript is “not readily available at this time.”
The IRS whistleblowers, supervisory special agent Gary Shapley, and a “Whistleblower X” who has not yet been publicly identified are set to testify before the House Oversight Committee on Wednesday.