President Donald J. Trump acknowledges an audience member after delivering remarks on the America First Healthcare Plan Thursday, Sept. 24, 2020, at the Duke Energy Hangar in Charlotte, North Carolina. (Official White House photo by Shealah Craighead)
Echoing the 2016 election, establishment media justified its refusal to investigate the Biden-family, influence-peddling story by claiming it was the work of "Russian disinformation."
U.S. intelligence officials have denied the claim, and no evidence has emerged to support it.
Now, NBC News is reporting Friday in a story prominently linked by the Drudge Report that there's a "dossier" that explains everything.
Under the headline "How a fake persona laid the groundwork for a Hunter Biden conspiracy deluge," NBC reports a 64-page document "that was later disseminated by close associates of President Donald Trump appears to be the work of a fake 'intelligence firm.'"
"One month before a purported leak of files from Hunter Biden's laptop, a fake 'intelligence' document about him went viral on the right-wing internet, asserting an elaborate conspiracy theory involving former Vice President Joe Biden's son and business in China," NBC reports.
The document, the network says, is part of a "wider effort to smear Hunter Biden and weaken Joe Biden's presidential campaign, which moved from the fringes of the internet to more mainstream conservative news outlets."
NBC still calls the New York Post stories about the discovery of emails purportedly from a laptop abandoned at a Delaware repair shop by Hunter Biden "unverified."
However, numerous people copied in the emails have confirmed their authenticity, and a cybersecurity expert conducted a forensic analysis examining the metadata and concluded the emails are genuine. Further, Joe Biden and his campaign have not denied that the emails are authentic, instead dismissing the evidence as a "smear."
Among those who have confirmed the emails are former Hunter Biden business partner Tony Bobulinski, who turned over evidence to the FBI one week ago that he was vetted by Joe Biden himself to help the family set up a business negotiating a deal with a Chinese company tied to the communist regime.
On Thursday, a Justice Department official told Sinclair Broadcasting that the FBI launched an investigation into Hunter Biden and his associates in 2019 on suspicion of money laundering.
'Viral pile-on of conspiracy theories'
NBC, meanwhile, said the "fake intelligence document" preceded the "leak" of the Hunter Biden laptop by months, helping "lay the groundwork among right-wing media for what would become a failed October surprise: a viral pile-on of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden."
"The groundwork," however, already had been laid by still-unrefuted evidence published by Peter Schweizer in his 2018 book "Secret Empires: How the American Political Class Hides Corruption and Enriches Family and Friends." and a follow-up, "Profiles in Corruption: Abuse of Power by America’s Progressive Elite," which presents evidence that five members of the Biden family "cashed in" while Joe Biden was vice president.
After the New York Post report of an email documenting a $10 million deal with the Chinese firm CEFC China Energy for "introductions," Schweizer noted in a Fox News interview that the New York Times reported the Biden connection in 2018.
The Times reported Hunter Biden's business partner, Ye Jianming, wanted "access to the corridors of power in Washington" and he soon "was meeting with the family of Joseph R. Biden Jr."
Ye, who had ties to the Chinese military and intelligence service, has been a fugitive since being taken into custody by Chinese authorities in 2018 on suspicision of economic crimes.
The New Yorker, Schweizer pointed out, also reported a Chinese business executive said he met with Joe Biden during the 2013 trip to Bejing on Air Force Two in which Hunter Biden accompanied his father and struck a $1.5 billion deal with a state-owned Chinese firm.
WND interviewed Schweizer in April 2018 about his book "Secret Empires," which shows how lawmakers, on a massive scale, are avoiding scrutiny through "corruption by proxy," using family and friends as "middlemen."
Bobulinski claims that tactic -- of providing distance between the politician and the family's deals -- was at work in the Biden family's business, claming Joe Biden clearly was in charge.
Bobulinski told Fox News' "Tucker Carlson Tonight" on Tuesday he raised concerns in 2017 to the former vice president's brother Jim Biden, about Joe Biden's ties to the joint venture with the Chinese firm.
Bobulinski, a retired lieutenant in the U.S. Navy, said he remembered asking, "How are you guys getting away with this? ‘Aren't you concerned?’'"
He claims Jim Biden chuckled and replied, "Plausible deniability."
There's more
WND reported Oct. 16 that Schweizer also obtained emails separate from the cache reported by the New York Post, from former Hunter Biden business associate Bevan Cooney.
Among them were emails showing Chinese investors and Communist Party officials used Hunter Biden to secure a private, off-the-books meeting with then-Vice President Joe Biden.
In September 2019, Schweizer released documents to counter ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos' claim that allegations of impropriety in the $1.5 billion investment deal had been debunked.
Schweizer noted at the time that the Biden campaign, among others, had tried to create the impression that Hunter Biden was only "passively involved" in the 2013 venture with a Chinese government-backed, private investment fund. But Schweizer posted online a copy of a document showing Hunter Biden was on the the "management team" of the fund, BHR Partners, as a board member. Further, Hunter Biden's business partner Devon Archer was vice chairman of the board and sat on the company's investment committee.
Significantly, the $1.5 billion deal with BHR Partners was struck 12 days after Hunter Biden traveled with his father on Air Force Two to Beijing.
"People have a right to know how precisely the Biden family was enriched, and what did Hunter Biden give them in return," Schweizer said in an interview in September 2019 with "Fox & Friends."
"He wasn't being paid for his expertise. He was being paid for something," he continued. "And I think we have a right to know what that something is."
The post NBC: 'Hunter Biden dossier' discredits 'right-wing conspiracy' appeared first on WND.
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