Since taking control of the House of Representative in January, Congressional Republicans – particularly Rep. James Comer (R-KY) and the House Oversight Committee – have been launching investigations into the Biden family. One such probe involves Hunter Biden’s business dealings in Ukraine, including his work as a board member for natural gas firm Burisma Holdings.
On Thursday, Fox News reported a confidential human source allegedly told the FBI during a June 2020 interview that then-Vice President Joe Biden was paid $5 million by a Burisma executive as part of a bribery scheme. The information was documented on a FBI-generated FD-1023 form dated June 30, 2020 and involved what is believed to be a highly credible source.
On Friday’s show, Megyn was joined by Victor Davis Hanson, author of The Dying Citizen, to discuss the revelations and President Biden’s shocking reaction when asked about the allegations.
What We Know About the Payment
The House has been trying to get access to this FD-1023 form, but the FBI was dragging its feet on producing it. After much prodding, FBI Director Christopher Wray finally delivered the document this week.
What we’ve learned from members of Congress who have seen it is that a trusted FBI source, who has been paid hundreds of thousands of dollars over the years for tips, learned through direct conversations with a Burisma executive that the company had to “pay the Bidens” because Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin was investigating it.
When the source suggested Burisma had paid $50,000 to both Hunter and Joe, the executive allegedly replied that it was actually $5 million each. The Bidens reportedly wanted the money distributed through many different bank accounts, so that investigators would not be able to “unravel this for at least 10 years.”
What we do know for sure is that President Biden ultimately was successful in getting Shokin, an anti-corruption prosecutor, removed from his post (though the President denies any influence peddling), and Burisma was able to enter the U.S. market as Hunter had recommended.
Biden Laughs Off the Allegations
During a White House press conference on Thursday, President Biden laughed off a question from the press about the payments. After asking “Where’s the money?” after hearing the inquiry from The New York Post reporter, the president called the report “a bunch of malarky” and said “I’m honest.”
Hanson was not impressed with the elder Biden’s approach. “That’s a very bad answer because it’s not just discounting the seriousness of it,” he noted. “But, when he says ‘where’s the money,’ it channeled right into the report that they had it hidden by all these paywalls and you couldn’t find the money. Biden is expressing confidence that you’re never going to find it. I dare you to find it after we set up all of these fake companies.”
What This Means for the Bidens
What’s interesting to note, in Hanson’s view, is that the two-page document was not classified. “So, why was Wray so paranoid about protecting it, and didn’t want any of it out, and kept denying that even it existed for a while or that he lost it,” he asked. “The sheer eagerness, or paranoia, or obsession fixation with not producing this suggests that he was very worried about anybody getting access to this.”
One of the reasons might be that it shouldn’t actually be all that difficult for House Republicans to get to the bottom of this. “I think that it’s a very easy thing to find out if they get the power to trace down all of Joe Biden’s bank accounts, all of his deposits, and then the type of huge expenditures for houses or other things that he purchased or gave away,” Hanson shared.
After all, the investigations into Hunter’s finances are already well under way. “We know that’s true because Hunter is facing – from all the leaks – serious IRS exposure and it’s based on the fact that they feel that he hasn’t reported income commensurate with the type of money that he was spending,” Hanson said.
For those reasons, he feels Wray is right to be worried. “I think it’s demonstrable,” Hanson concluded of a potential financial investigation. “And that may explain why Wray was so scared to release that because he thought it might be explosive enough to bring down a president.”
You can check out Megyn’s full analysis by tuning in to episode 569 on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you like to listen. And don’t forget that you can catch The Megyn Kelly Show live on SiriusXM’s Triumph (channel 111) weekdays from 12pm to 2pm ET.