Grassley’s ‘17 Recordings’ Bombshell Brings Bidens And Burisma Back Into The Spotlight
The Ukrainian owner of Burisma allegedly made 17 audio recordings of conversations with the Bidens, Sen. Chuck Grassley revealed Monday from the Senate Floor. Then-Vice President Joe Biden may also have been involved in prompting Burisma to hire his son for a cushy job on the board of directors, according to Grassley’s summary of the FD-1023 confidential human source report the FBI continues to withhold from Congress.
These new details, coupled with the House Oversight Committee’s subpoenaing of Hunter’s business partner and fellow Burisma board member on Monday, place the Ukrainian oil and gas company back in the spotlight of the Biden family pay-to-play scandal.
For the last month, Grassley and House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer have pushed the FBI to release the FD-1023 CHS report that alleged a foreign national — identified by individuals with knowledge of the matter as Mykola Zlochevsky — had bribed the Bidens to influence policy decisions. Zlochevsky, the founder of the Ukrainian oil and gas company Burisma, had allegedly told a “highly credible” CHS, that he paid then-Vice President Biden $5 million and Hunter another $5 million to prompt the firing of a prosecutor looking into Burisma corruption.
The FBI refuses to release the FD-1023, however, prompting Grassley to call for transparency. To that end, the Iowa Republican told the country that “the foreign national who allegedly bribed Joe and Hunter Biden allegedly has audio recordings of his conversations with them.”
“Seventeen total recordings,” Grassley continued. “According to the 1023, the foreign national possesses 15 audio recordings of phone calls between him and Hunter Biden.” Another two audio recordings involve calls between Zlochevsky and then-Vice President Joe Biden, Grassley stressed.
Then, after noting that Zlochevsky kept the recordings “as a sort of insurance policy,” Grassley added that the same FD-1023 also indicated that “then-Vice President Joe Biden may have been involved in Burisma employing Hunter Biden.”
Americans have long known Burisma paid Hunter Biden ridiculous sums of money to sit on its board, but until yesterday, the sham seemed crafted by the Ukrainian company to buy influence with the Obama-Biden administration. Now, however, it also appears the then-vice president had a hand in Hunter’s position on the board.
The claims that Zlochevsky possessed recordings — not just of Hunter Biden, but also of “the Big Guy” — suggests we face a serious national security risk, with a compromised president potentially beholden to a blackmailer.
This new revelation makes FBI headquarters’ burying of the FD-1023 doubly bad: Not only did the FBI improperly discard the CHS’s intel as “disinformation” and thus not adequately investigate the Bidens’ activities, but the bureau apparently also failed to consider the need to provide Biden a defensive briefing.
In addition to unveiling these two new important details, Grassley suggested more details will be forthcoming. “I want everyone to remember that I have read the unredacted version” of the FD-1023, the Iowa senator said as he ended his floor speech.
What Grassley will reveal next, however, is but one of the worries for the Bidens. Yesterday also brought news that the House Oversight Committee had subpoenaed Hunter’s ex-business partner and friend Devon Archer to testify on Friday.
Archer had sat on the board of Burisma with Hunter. The two were also longtime business partners at Rosemont Seneca. Archer was reportedly “present at meetings Hunter arranged for his foreign business partners to meet with his father or talk to him on the phone.” Archer was also famously photographed meeting then-Vice President Joe Biden “in his White House office weeks before Archer and Hunter joined the board of the corrupt Ukrainian energy company Burisma.”
These facts suggest Archer may be able to confirm some of the details provided by the CHS. It seems unlikely Archer will talk, though, with Hunter’s former business partner instead likely asserting his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. On the other hand, Archer recently lost his challenge to an unrelated criminal conviction for fraud, and he may see cooperation as more attractive now.
But that presumes Archer has someone to bargain with, and the Biden DOJ is unlikely to want to cut a deal with him. The Republican-controlled House may, however, and while not widely known, it also has the power to grant immunity from criminal prosecution. That might just be what is needed to expose the extent of the Bidens’ corruption.
The corruption of the DOJ and the FBI is another matter entirely — hundreds more whistleblowers are needed for that enterprise.
Margot Cleveland is The Federalist’s senior legal correspondent. She is also a contributor to National Review Online, the Washington Examiner, Aleteia, and Townhall.com, and has been published in the Wall Street Journal and USA Today. Cleveland is a lawyer and a graduate of the Notre Dame Law School, where she earned the Hoynes Prize—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. As a stay-at-home homeschooling mom of a young son with cystic fibrosis, Cleveland frequently writes on cultural issues related to parenting and special-needs children. Cleveland is on Twitter at @ProfMJCleveland. The views expressed here are those of Cleveland in her private capacity.
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