Several former intelligence officials who signed a letter suggesting the Hunter Biden laptop was likely a “Russian intelligence operation” are joining a federal “expert” board that handles national security issues, the announced the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) on Tuesday.
Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, former CIA Director John Brennan and former CIA operations officer Paul Kolbe, who will now serve on the council, signed an October 2020 letter that questioned the legitimacy of the Hunter Biden laptop and suggested its release was a Russian disinformation ploy. The group will advise DHS on intelligence and homeland security efforts on issues including “terrorism, fentanyl, cross-border issues and emerging technology,” DHS announced.
The contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop were authenticated by the Daily Caller News Foundation, as well as The New York Times, Washington Post, CBS News and other media outlets. There is currently no evidence to suggest the laptop was a Russian disinformation operation.
The group will meet four times a year to advise DHS on countering threats to national security, according to the agency.
“The security of the American people depends on our ability to collect, generate, and disseminate actionable intelligence to our federal, state, local, territorial, tribal, campus, and private sector partners,” said Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro N. Mayorkas in a statement on Tuesday about the formation of the group. “I express my deep gratitude to these distinguished individuals for devoting their exceptional expertise, experience and vision to our critical mission.”
Biden himself used the letter, the conclusion of which is false, to characterize the reports about the laptop’s contents as a “bunch of garbage.”
However, former CIA Deputy Director Michael Morrell testified before the House Judiciary Committee that Biden’s top adviser at the time, Antony Blinken, who is now Secretary of State, “triggered” the creation of the letter. Former CIA chief of staff Jeremy Bash, who signed the letter, connected Morrell and then-Biden campaign chairman Steve Richetti; Bash was later appointed to Biden’s Intelligence Advisory Council.
Additionally, both Clapper and Brennan have previously been criticized for misleading the American public.
Clapper gave incorrect information to Congress on several occasions, including in one instance when he gave “inconsistent testimony” about contacts he had with the media while in office. Brennan, for his part, denied that CIA officials had hacked into the computers of Senate Intelligence Committee employees, a claim that was later shown to be false.
The letter signed by Brennan, Clapper and Kolbe argued that the release of emails from the laptop was an attempt by Russia to influence the US election.
“We are writing to say that the arrival on the American political scene of emails purportedly belonging to Vice President Biden’s son Hunter, much of which relates to his time on the board of the Ukrainian gas company Burisma, has every classic labels of a Russian. information operation,” the 2020 letter said.
“If we’re right, this is Russia trying to influence how Americans vote in this election, and we strongly believe that Americans need to be aware of that,” the letter added.
In a February letter to the Department of Justice (DOJ), lawyers representing Hunter Biden appeared to admit that the data on his laptop is real.
Several social media platforms censored the New York Post’s reporting on Hunter Biden’s laptop file.
Post written by Jennie Taer. Reprinted with permission from DCNF.
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