Bombshell FBI file claims Biden family received $10m bribe

US President Joe Biden and his son Hunter have been named in a bombshell secret report from an FBI source over an alleged $US10m bribe from a Ukraine oligarch.

A Ukrainian oligarch claimed he was coerced into paying a $US10m bribe to Joe Biden’s family, according to a secret informer’s bombshell report to the FBI.

Mykola Zlochevksy, the chief executive of an oil and gas company which had the President’s son Hunter on its board, also claimed to have taped the Bidens on 17 occasions about the payment -- two of which involved Joe.

For several months, Republicans have argued the secret file implicates the President in a foreign bribery scheme. It was publicly released on Friday after Senator Chuck Grassley obtained it through whistleblowers at the US Department of Justice.

While Republicans hailed the document as evidence of Mr Biden’s involvement, the informer’s report was less definitive, quoting Mr Zlochevksy as saying: “It cost 5 (million) to pay one Biden, and 5 (million) to another Biden.”

Hunter had involved several other members of his family in his work overseas, which has long been a focus of the President’s political rivals.

Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden are accused of accepting a $10 million bribe. Picture: Getty Images

Hunter was advising Burisma on acquiring a US-based business, and the FBI informer reported that Mr Zlochevsky claimed to have been “coerced into paying the Bidens” to ensure a Ukrainian prosecutor who was investigating the company was fired.

Mr Biden publicly pushed for the prosecutor to be sacked -- while he was the vice president -- but he did so as part of a multi-country effort targeting his failure to prosecute corruption.

And according to a separate document released last month by Democrat congressman Jamie Raskin, detailing a 2019 conversation between Mr Zlochevsky and an unnamed source who was seeking dirt on behalf of Donald Trump, the oligarch said no one from his company “ever had contacts with VP Biden or people working for him”.

He said “no” when asked if Mr Biden, as the vice president, had ever assisted him in his business dealings.

The President has repeatedly denied being involved in his son’s business. Last month, when asked about the FBI file, he called the allegation “a bunch of malarkey” and quipped: “Where’s the money?”

The day before the release of the file, two investigators from the US tax office told a congressional committee there was a pattern of “slow-walking investigative steps” in their probe of Hunter’s finances, with one of the whistleblowers saying he felt “handcuffed”.

The Internal Revenue Service agents said Burisma paid “everyone involved” in the Biden family approximately $7.3m. They did not present evidence of payments to the President.

A spokesman for Democrats on the Republican-controlled House Oversight Committee -- which has been pursuing the Biden family’s affairs -- said the committee had been told by the FBI “in no uncertain terms” that it “failed to identify sufficient evidence to justify further investigation” of the informer’s bribery claims.

The FBI closed its assessment in August 2020 when Mr Trump was still the president.

WHISTLEBLOWER CLAIMS BIDEN COVERUP

A whistleblower who led the criminal investigation into the US president’s son, Hunter Biden, revealed his identity and claimed he was “handcuffed” from fully pursuing the case.

Previously known as “Agent X”, Special Agent Joseph Ziegler revealed himself to US Congress as a 13-year veteran of the Internal Revenue Service and a lifelong Democrat.

He is the second IRS whistleblower to allege their federal investigation into Hunter Biden, which recommended several felonies, was hamstrung into a less serious plea deal on misdemeanour tax charges.

Whistleblowers Gary Shapley, Supervisory IRS Special Agent, and Joseph Ziegler, IRS’s lead investigator into Hunter Biden. AFP

A House Committee on Oversight and Accountability focusing on “the Biden family’s influence peddling schemes” heard from Ziegler and Supervisory Special Agent Gary Shapley. Ziegler worked on the case since 2018 and Shapley joined in 2020.

“I recently discovered that people are saying that I must be more credible because I’m a Democrat who happens to be married to a man,” Ziegler said.

US President Joe Biden and Hunter Biden, who are alleged to have participated in an influence peddling scheme. Picture: AFP

“I’m no more credible than this man sitting next to me due to my sexual orientation or my political beliefs. “

Both men, 13- and 14-year veterans of the tax agency, allege US attorneys appointed by Joe Biden opposed the charging of Hunter Biden with tax crimes in Southern California and Washington DC.

They claim their investigation was blocked, slowed at every turn, and hindered by authorities tipping off Hunter Biden’s legal team about potential searches of storage lockers.

Prosecutors at the office of Delaware US Attorney David Weiss also allegedly barred interviews with other Biden family members over the president’s potential role in Hunter’s international consulting work.

Here is proof Hunter Biden paid prostitutes through his law firm, OWASCO PC, and trafficked his victims across state lines in violation of the Mann Act.

Not only that, IRS whistleblowers confirm Hunter Biden committed tax fraud by deducting payments to prostitutes from OWASCO’s… pic.twitter.com/JAB0cPMNrM

— Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene🇺🇸 (@RepMTG) July 19, 2023

Shapley said the Delaware US Attorney’s Office “slow-walked” interviews and the serving of document requests. They were also said to have delayed the execution of search warrants until after the 2020 presidential election in November, despite being ready to serve as early as April that year.

According to the whistleblower testimony, the IRS found that Hunter Biden was paid USD $17 million from foreign income streams between 2014 to 2019, including $6.5 from Ukraine oil and gas company Burisma, and $3.7m from Hudson West III [CEFC China Energy], and $3m from CEFC subsidiary.

“After an electronic search warrant on Hunter Biden’s Apple iCloud account led us to WhatsApp messages with several CEFC China Energy executives where he claimed to be sitting and discussing business with his father Joe Biden, we sought permission to follow up on the information in the messages,” Shapley said.

“Prosecutors would not allow it.”

Whistleblower Joseph Ziegler says he is labelled a ‘traitor’ to his Democratic Party and identity in the LGBT community. Picture: AFP

Their testimony that the US Attorney in Delaware said he was not able to bring charges outside his district is in direct contradiction of US Attorney-General Merrick Garland.

Shapley, however, said there was no evidence Garland intentionally misled Congress when he said prosecutors had authority to try the case in any jurisdiction.

“Although these facts contradict the Attorney-General’s testimony and raise serious questions for you to investigate, I have never claimed evidence that Attorney-General Garland knowingly lied to Congress,” Shapley said.

“This for others to investigate and determine whether those letters contain knowingly false statements … I don’t claim to be privy to United States Attorney Weiss’s or Attorney-General Garland’s communications.”

Originally published as Bombshell FBI file claims Biden family received $10m bribe