With News of Hunter Biden's Criminal Probe, Recall the Media Outlets That
Peddled the "Russian Disinformation" Lie
The now-validated facts about Hunter are precisely those the U.S. media -- in
tandem with Silicon Valley and the intelligence community -- suppressed based
on lies.
Glenn Greenwald
Dec 10
Clockwise: Politico, Oct. 19; CNN, Oct. 25; NPR, Oct. 22; The Boston Globe,
Oct. 20
The revelation that Hunter Biden is being criminally investigated for his
business activities in China came on Monday from the investigative target
himself, and he predictably and self-servingly depicted it as just a narrow
probe about his “tax affairs” by the U.S. Attorney for Delaware. As I wrote
last night, that by itself would be significant enough — the documents
published in the weeks before the election by The New York Post contained ample
information about exactly that matter, yet were widely repressed by a union of
mainstream news outlets, the intelligence community and Silicon Valley based on
propaganda and lies. But new reporting suggest the investigation has been far
broader.
“The federal investigation into President-elect Joe Biden’s son Hunter has been
more extensive than a statement from Hunter Biden indicates,” Politico reported
Monday night. Specifically, “the securities fraud unit in the Southern District
of New York also scrutinized Hunter Biden’s finances”; “investigators in
Delaware and Washington were also probing potential money laundering and Hunter
Biden’s foreign ties”; and “federal authorities in the Western District of
Pennsylvania are conducting a criminal investigation of a hospital business in
which Joe Biden’s brother James was involved.” CNN’s Shimon Prokupecz added
that “at least one of the matters investigators have examined is a 2017 gift of
a 2.8-carat diamond that Hunter Biden received from CEFC [China Energy’]'s
founder and former chairman Ye Jianming after a Miami business meeting.”
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All of these topics are what the large bulk of the U.S. media, working in
concert with the intelligence community and Silicon Valley, suppressed prior to
the election. One of the first New York Post articles based on materials from
Hunter’s laptop, headlined “Emails reveal how Hunter Biden tried to cash in big
on behalf of family with Chinese firm,” described how he “pursued lucrative
deals involving China’s largest private energy company — including one that he
said would be ‘interesting for me and my family,’” and specifically noted that
Hunter “was identified as ‘Chair/Vice Chair depending on agreement with CEFC,’
an apparent reference to the former Shanghai-based conglomerate CEFC China
Energy Co.”
That was the same email that referenced ten percent to be “held by H for the
big guy” — which one of Hunter’s business partners on the email chain, Tony
Bobulinski, stated categorically referred to Joe Biden. The Wall Street Journal
columnist Kimberly Strassel similarly reviewed numerous laptop documents and
reported that “records produced by Mr. Bobulinski show that in 2017, Hunter
Biden and James Biden were involved in negotiations about a joint venture with
a Chinese energy and finance company called CEFC China Energy," adding that the
documents also “make clear that Hunter Biden saw the family name as a valuable
asset, angrily citing his 'family’s brand' as a reason he is valuable to the
proposed venture."
Email from Hunter Biden’s laptop published by The New York Post on Oct. 15, 2020
The pre-election article I wrote and was blocked from publishing by The
Intercept, which precipitated my departure from that outlet, extensively
discussed these documents’ revelations regarding the attempts by Hunter and
Biden’s brother Jim to exploit the former Vice President’s influence in China
to generate profit for the Biden family. Among other things, the censored
article described “the Biden family's pursuit of business opportunities in
China,” referenced “proposals for lucrative business deals in China that traded
on his influence with his father,” discussed the possibility suggested by the
emails that “Hunter along with Joe Biden's brother Jim were planning on
including the former Vice President in at least one deal in China,” and argued
that these documents raise the critical question of “whether Biden ever knew
about business proposals in Ukraine or China being pursued by his son and
brother in which Biden was a proposed participant.”
All of these vital facts and questions about Hunter’s activities in China were
largely suppressed from the voting population by the bulk of the U.S. media,
working in tandem with Silicon Valley (which simply prevented the story from
being discussed and shared on its key platforms), and the intelligence
community. How was this accomplished? Largely through outright propaganda, a
blatant two-pronged lie: that these materials should be ignored because they
constitute “Russian disinformation.”
There has never been any evidence that Russia played any role whatsoever in
these materials (The New York Times acknowledged that “no concrete evidence has
emerged that the laptop contains Russian disinformation” and the paper said
even the FBI has “acknowledged that it had not found any Russian disinformation
on the laptop”). This newly disclosed criminal probe obviously constitutes very
strong evidence of their authenticity, as was the confirmation at the time from
several participants in the emails that they were genuine. Critically, not even
the Bidens denied the materials from the laptop were authentic, as The Times
noted last night in its story about the criminal investigation into Hunter:
“The Biden team has rejected some of the claims made in the NY Post articles,
but has not disputed the authenticity of the [laptop] files upon which they
were based.”
Even the letter used by these media outlets to peddle the “Russian
disinformation” lie — from known liars: former CIA and other intelligence
community leaders, who claimed that the Hunter laptop story “has all the
classic earmarks of a Russian information” — admitted that “we do not have
evidence of Russian involvement.”
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In sum, we have the extraordinary historic disgrace of media outlets
collaborating with the intelligence community in the weeks before a
presidential election to manufacture and peddle a propagandistic lie to justify
censorship of highly relevant materials about the presidential front-runner and
his family’s efforts to profit off his name — namely, that the documents were
not authentic but rather “Russian disinformation.”
It is vital to recall which media outlets did this and how they deceived the
public yet again:
Politico’s Natasha Bertrand, Oct. 19, 2020:
NBC News’ Ken Dilanian and Tom Winter, Oct. 30, 2020:
U.S. intelligence agencies have informed the White House that Giuliani has been
in contact with alleged Russian intelligence agents. The FBI has been looking
into whether the Russians played any role, and no official has ruled that out.
At the same time, dozens of former intelligence officials have said the story
has the hallmarks of a Russian intelligence operation. After the election
interference of 2016, the news media is especially wary of doing anything to
further an effort by a foreign government to intervene in a presidential
campaign.
The Intercept, Oct. 21, 2020:
This week, a group of former intelligence officials issued a letter saying that
the Giuliani laptop story has the classic trademarks of Russian disinformation.
The Economist, Oct. 31, 2020:
Whether they are real or fake is not the main point, argues Marc
Polymeropoulos, the CIA’s former acting chief of operations for the Europe and
Eurasia Mission Centre—one of more than 50 retired intelligence officials who
signed a letter arguing that the email dump “has all the classic earmarks of a
Russian intelligence operation”.
The Washington Post, Op-Ed by Thomas Rid, Oct. 24, 2020:
"We must treat the Hunter Biden leaks as if they were a foreign intelligence
operation — even if they probably aren't."
CNN’s Christiane Amanpour, Oct. 25, 2020:
60 Minutes’ Leslie Stahl, Oct. 22, 2020:
Anders Hagstrom @Hagstrom_Anders
This exchange between Trump and Lesley Stahl is insane. She repeatedly insists
the Biden laptops “can’t be verified” so reporters shouldn’t talk about it.
Trump asks her why it can’t be verified. Her answer: “Because it can’t be
verified.”
October 22nd 2020
6,374 Retweets15,465 Likes
The Boston Globe, Oct. 20, 2020:
NPR, Oct. 22, 2020:
NPR Public Editor @NPRpubliceditor
Why haven't you seen any stories from NPR about the NY Post's Hunter Biden
story? Read more in this week's newsletter➡️ tinyurl.com/y67vlzj2
October 22nd 2020
8,065 Retweets21,215 Likes
Leading up to the 2020 election, much of the U.S. media and Silicon Valley
giants decided that ensuring Trump’s defeat was such an overarching goal, a
moral imperative, that anything and everything was justified to achieve it —
including uniting with the professional liars of the CIA to disseminate blatant
falsehoods about the Hunter Biden materials in order to discredit them, lead
the public to believe they should be ignored, and justify their own burying and
censoring of these materials.
There were some noble exceptions, such as a Washington Post news story from
October 24 which — despite its inflammatory headline: “Biden relies on pattern
of activity to blame Russia for release of data from what is said to be his
son’s laptop” — warned that “the former intelligence and defense officials who
penned the letter explicitly said they had no evidence of Russian involvement”
and “the Biden campaign’s decision to lean into accusations of Russian
involvement in the episode, despite lacking specific proof, risks eroding
public trust in U.S. allegations of foreign election interference if the
suspicions in this case turn out to be unfounded.”
But most outlets which cited the letter from CIA and other intelligence
officials simply omitted that no-evidence admission altogether, or buried it so
deep in their stories and broadcasts that all the public heard was that these
completely authentic and obviously relevant documents could and should be
safely ignored as “Russian disinformation.”
That’s the choice these media outlets made. They got the election outcome they
wanted. But they and their reputations and legacy will have to live with this
choice.
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