An FBI informant has been charged with two counts of making false statements to federal authorities about President Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden’s business with a Ukrainian energy company.
A grand jury in the Central District of California indicted Alexander Smirnov, 43, as part of special counsel David Weiss’s investigation, with Weiss separately having investigated Hunter Biden for firearm and tax violations.
The 37-page indictment said Smirnov was an informant with the FBI since 2010. Smirnov allegedly told the FBI in 2020 that Burisma, a Ukrainian energy company, hired Hunter Biden to “protect us, through his dad, from all kinds of problems,” which the indictment stated is a false statement. In another, according to the Department of Justice, Smirnov said Burisma officials paid Hunter Biden and the president $5 million each when Joe Biden was vice president.
According to the indictment, the claims Smirnov first made to the FBI in June 2020 “were fabrications.” Joe Biden is described in the court documents as “Public Official 1,” while Hunter Biden is described as “Businessperson 1.”
The indictment claimed that while Smirnov said he had contact with Burisma officials during Joe Biden’s time in the Obama administration, he only had contact after the then-vice president left office in 2017 when he “had no ability to influence U.S. policy.”
“In short, the Defendant transformed his routine and unextraordinary business contacts with Burisma in 2017 and later into bribery allegations against Public Official 1, the presumptive nominee of one of the two major political parties for President, after expressing bias against Public Official 1 and his candidacy,” the indictment reads.
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Republicans in Congress have launched an impeachment inquiry into Joe Biden and his son, accusing the president of corruption, with Smirnov’s allegations playing a central part in their investigation.
Smirnov was arrested at Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas following a trip overseas and was expected to make his first appearance in a federal court on Thursday afternoon. It’s unclear if Smirnov has an attorney.