Biden Bribery Breadcrumbs Leave Only One Possible Conclusion: Deep-State Partisans Buried The Evidence

The Federalist’s blockbuster exclusive on Tuesday revealed U.S. Attorney David Weiss was spoonfed The New York Times’ false narrative that the Pittsburgh U.S. attorney had pushed the Delaware office to investigate Rudy Giuliani’s claims of Biden family corruption. That revelation adds new texture to the IRS whistleblowers’ earlier testimony. More importantly, it suggests a select few DOJ and FBI agents buried the FD-1023 sent to Delaware for further investigation — a report memorializing a “highly credible” FBI confidential human source’s claims that Burisma paid $5 million bribes each to Hunter and Joe Biden.

On Dec. 11, 2020, The New York Times ran an article titled, “Material from Giuliani Spurred a Separate Justice Depart. Pursuit of Hunter Biden.” As I previously detailed, the Times’ reporting was “replete with falsehoods and deceptive narratives,” and sought to paint the “then-U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania, Scott Brady, whom Barr had tasked with screening any new material related to Ukraine,” as a partisan hack out to get the Bidens. The article falsely represented Brady as pushing the Delaware U.S. attorney’s office to investigate the Bidens based on material provided by Rudy Giuliani.

However, as a whistleblower would later confide in Sen. Chuck Grassley, the Pittsburgh U.S. attorney’s office had sought the investigation not of Giuliani material, but of separate intel provided by a longtime and “highly credible” confidential human source (CHS) on which agents briefed the Delaware office.

As Grassley explained in a July 2023 letter to Weiss, “[O]n October 23, 2020, Justice Department and FBI Special Agents from the Pittsburgh Field Office briefed Assistant U.S. Attorney Lesley Wolf, one of your top prosecutors, and FBI Special Agents from the Baltimore Field Office with respect to the contents of the FBI-generated FD-1023 alleging a criminal bribery scheme involving then-Vice President Biden and Hunter Biden.”

Grassley would later release a minimally redacted copy of the FD-1023, which confirmed the information provided to the Delaware office came not from Giuliani, but from the CHS.

An individual familiar with that Oct. 23 meeting previously confirmed to The Federalist that Weiss was not present for it. That detail gained new significance last week when FOIA documents, obtained by the Heritage Foundation following its lawsuit against the DOJ, revealed that one of Weiss’s top assistant U.S. attorneys forwarded him the Times article portraying the Pittsburgh evidence as originating from Giuliani.

With the Times piece purportedly sourced to “five current and former law enforcement officials and others with knowledge of F.B.I. interactions with the Justice Department,” unless someone told Weiss about the FD-1023 or its contents, Weiss would have had no basis to know the Pittsburgh office had given the Delaware office independent evidence of Biden family corruption. And this was evidence that had already been partially corroborated, as the Pennsylvania-based agents detailed in the briefing on Oct. 23, 2020.

So the key question, as Grassley asked Weiss, is when did he first learn of the FD-1023?

Weiss has yet to answer that question. But IRS whistleblower Gary Shapley’s testimony and supplemental affidavit suggest Wolf and the Baltimore agents briefed by Pittsburgh about the FD-1023 buried that evidence.

During Shapley’s testimony to the House Ways and Means Committee, the IRS special agent made no mention of the FD-1023. Later, though, after former Attorney General William Barr confirmed to The Federalist that the FD-1023 had been sent to Delaware for further investigation, Shapley submitted a supplemental affidavit.

In it, Shapley said no one provided him, the line IRS agents acting under his supervision, or the FBI agents working with the IRS the FD-1023 or any of the details included in the FD-1023. Shapley further stated that he and other IRS investigators had requested to be included in the briefing from the Pittsburgh office but their requests were denied.

One tidbit from Shapley’s testimony to the House Ways and Means Committee further suggests Wolf and whoever else from the FBI Baltimore field office attended the October briefing buried the FD-1023.

In discussing a Dec. 3, 2020, meeting of the Delaware prosecution team — a meeting Weiss was in and out of — Shapley noted his team wanted to interview one of Hunter Biden’s associates to ask him, among other things, what “Ten held by H for the big guy” referenced.

“But AUSA Wolf interjected and said she did not want to ask about the big guy,” Shapley explained. Then when, as the IRS whistleblower put it, “multiple people in the room spoke up and objected that we had to ask,” Wolf responded, “there’s no specific criminality to that line of questioning.”

While “multiple people in the room” allegedly objected to Wolf’s limits on questioning, none of them apparently challenged Wolf’s claim that there was “no specific criminality.” Nor did anyone present raise the FD-1023 or the CHS.

Surely, they would have, though — if they knew about its existence.

This again raises the question: Who knew of the FD-1023, and when did Weiss learn of its existence?

From Grassley’s whistleblower, it appears Wolf included at least two Baltimore field office agents in the brief. However, from Shapley’s testimony, it appears the Baltimore field agents Wolf allowed to participate in the briefing were not the ones working Hunter’s case — which makes no sense.

That is, unless you are trying to bury the evidence.

Margot Cleveland is an investigative journalist and legal analyst and serves as The Federalist’s senior legal correspondent. Margot’s work has been published at The Wall Street Journal, The American Spectator, the New Criterion (forthcoming), National Review Online, Townhall.com, the Daily Signal, USA Today, and the Detroit Free Press.
She is also a regular guest on nationally syndicated radio programs and on Fox News, Fox Business, and Newsmax. Cleveland is a lawyer and a graduate of the Notre Dame Law School, where she earned the Hoynes Prive—the law school’s highest honor. She later served for nearly 25 years as a permanent law clerk for a federal appellate judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals.

Cleveland is a former full-time university faculty member and now teaches as an adjunct from time to time. Cleveland is also of counsel for the New Civil Liberties Alliance.

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Who buried the Biden bribery scandal? Mounting evidence of deep-state corruption and cover-ups demands an answer.