The CIA’s involvement in the 2020 Hunter Biden abandoned laptop scandal has come under fresh scrutiny with recent congressional testimony suggesting the agency solicited signatures for a letter circulated by the Biden campaign. The letter, signed by over 50 then-current and former senior U.S. intelligence officials, alleged the laptop story was likely a Russian disinformation plot.
David Cariens, a former CIA analyst and one of the letter’s signatories, disclosed that he was approached by a CIA employee affiliated with the agency’s Prepublication Classification Review Board (PCRB) and asked to sign the document. In an email to congressional investigators, Cariens wrote, “When the person in charge of reviewing my book called to say it was approved with no changes, I was told about the draft letter. The person asked me if I would be willing to sign.”
BREAKING: CIA helped rig the election for Biden! CIA Solicited Signatures For Hunter Biden Laptop Letter, Congressional Testimony Shows https://t.co/6TTa26TcJM
— Tom Fitton (@TomFitton) May 10, 2023
Cariens’ agreement to sign the letter raises serious questions about the impartiality of the PCRB, an entity tasked with ensuring that classified information does not make its way into the public sphere.
The letter was first submitted to the PCRB by former CIA acting director and Joe Biden campaign surrogate Mike Morell. In a staggering display of urgency, the letter was acknowledged, reviewed, and cleared in less than 12 hours. Morell himself admitted in his testimony before Congress that he had drafted the letter to arm Joe Biden with a rebuttal to then-President Donald Trump’s claims in a 2020 presidential debate that was rapidly approaching.
However, the move by the CIA goes beyond a simple rush job. Instead, it is a case of our intelligence community, meant to be apolitical, meddling in the political arena. This potentially tipped the scales in Biden’s favor by muzzling legitimate questions about the contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop and the possible corruption they suggested.
The letter played a crucial role in justifying the widespread censorship by social media platforms of news outlets reporting on the laptop’s contents. Even though there was no evidence that the laptop and its contents were Russian disinformation, the Department of Justice took possession of the laptop under a federal grand jury subpoena in December 2019.
This apparent collaboration between U.S. intelligence agencies and social media companies may have influenced the 2020 election results. A 2022 poll by TIPP Insights revealed that 47% of respondents, including 45% of independents, said knowledge of the laptop contents being genuine and not Russian disinformation likely would have changed their votes.
Morell testified that a current CIA official’s involvement in the promotion and solicitation for participation in the letter would be highly inappropriate. Yet, the testimony of Cariens suggests that this might be exactly what happened.
