During a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee last week, FBI Deputy Director Paul Abbate confessed that the agency had removed references to audio files of Joe and Hunter Biden from a file shown to Republican senators wherein an FBI informant claimed the Bidens had been involved in a bribery scheme in 2015 and 2016.
According to a report, Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) pressed Abbate for details, and he confirmed that the document was redacted to safeguard the source.
The report was a transcription of an FBI discussion with an informant and was made public by Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA). It included references to 17 supposed audio recordings, 15 of which included Hunter Biden and two of which involved then-Vice President Joe Biden. According to Grassley, references to the audio recordings were removed before the paper was released to the House Oversight Committee last week in response to pressure from Republicans.
Grassley said the paper, which the FBI insisted legislators read in a SCIF (Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility), was unclassified and should not have been censored.
Abbate had first avoided answering, despite Blackburn’s repeated requests for an explanation of the redactions.
Blackburn told him that it would be beneficial for the FBI to answer questions during their appearances to avoid the perception of politicization and bias toward certain individuals.
Abbate denied the FBI is political. Blackburn disagreed.
According to recent polls, a growing number of Americans suspect that President Joe Biden was involved in his family’s international business dealings.
Polling sheds light on the rising popular view that Joe Biden was engaged in the Biden family company in some way, despite his repeated denials of participating or even discussing the agreements with Hunter Biden.
Sixty-six percent of respondents in a recent Harvard/HarrisX June survey said they felt Joe Biden talked business with his son, an increase from the number who said Biden took no part in the family company.
