Connect with us

Politics

IRS whistleblower Shapley said he 'could no longer pursue' Hunter Biden sugar brother Kevin Morris due to CIA

Published

on

IRS whistleblower Shapley said he 'could no longer pursue' Hunter Biden sugar brother Kevin Morris due to CIA

IRS whistleblower Gary Shapley said he was told he “could no longer pursue” Hunter Biden “sugar brother” Kevin Morris as a witness due to information provided by the CIA, according to an affidavit released Wednesday. 

Fox News Digital first reported earlier this year that a whistleblower claimedthe CIA “stonewalled” an IRS interview with Morris, who provided millions of dollars to pay the first son’s tax debts. Those whistleblowers said the CIA “intervened to stop the interview” with Morris in August 2021. 

The CIA told Fox News Digital those allegations were false. 

Shapley’s affidavit, released Wednesday, shed further light the CIA’s alleged interference in the attempted interview with Morris.

WHISTLEBLOWER CLAIMS CIA ‘STONEWALLED’ IRS INTERVIEW WITH HUNTER BIDEN ‘SUGAR BROTHER’ KEVIN MORRIS: HOUSE GOP

Advertisement

“In and around August 2021, discussions were ongoing within the prosecution team on the Hunter Biden investigation concerning witnesses who needed to be interviewed in furtherance of the investigation,” Shapley said in his affidavit. 

Shapley said that Assistant U.S. Attorney Lesley Wolf told the team that she and DOJ Tax Attorney Jack Morgan “had recently returned from the Central Intelligence Agency headquarters in Langley, Virginia, where they had been summoned to discuss Kevin Morris.” 

Shapley said “Wolf stated that they were provided a classified briefing in relation to Mr. Morris and as a result we could no longer pursue him as a witness.” 

Hunter Biden, son of U.S. President Joe Biden, flanked by Kevin Morris, left, and Abbe Lowell, right, attend a House Oversight Committee meeting on January 10, 2024 in Washington, DC. (Kent Nishimura/Getty Images)

“Investigators probed AUSA Wolf, but since her briefing was classified and she was apparently sanitizing it to an unclassified form to share over an open phone line, she did not elaborate with more information,” Shapley said, adding that Wolf “reiterated more than once that they were summoned to the CIA in Langley concerning Mr. Morris, and that because of the information provided there, he could not be a witness for the investigation.” 

Advertisement

Shapley recalled that Wolf “proudly referenced a CIA mug and stated that she purchased some CIA ‘swag’ at the gift shop while she was there.” 

“It is unclear how the CIA became aware that Mr. Morris was a potential witness in the Hunter Biden investigation and why agents were not told about the meeting in advance or invited to participate,” Shapley said. “It is a deviation of normal investigative processes for prosecutors to exclude investigators from substantive meetings such as this.” 

The CIA told Fox News Digital last month that allegations it stonewalled the interview with Morris were “false.” 

“Without confirming or denying the existence of any associations or communications, CIA did not prevent or seek to prevent IRS or DOJ from conducting any such interview,” James Catella, the CIA’s director of the Office of Congressional Affairs, wrote in a letter to Jordan and Comer. “The allegation is false.” 

The CIA said that, as a general matter and “without specific reference to the issue about which you have inquired, CIA facilitates the Department of Justice’s access to national security information in the context of investigations and prosecutions in a variety of circumstances.” 

Advertisement

CIA DENIES WHISTLEBLOWER ALLEGATION THAT AGENCY ‘STONEWALLED’ IRS INTERVIEW WITH HUNTER BIDEN ‘SUGAR BROTHER’

“For example, CIA engages with DOJ to enable prosecutors to understand national security information that may arise in the course of an investigation and to assess their discovery obligations,” Catella wrote. 

Central Intelligence Agency

A spokesperson for the CIA previously denied preventing the IRS to interview Hunter Biden’s friend Kevin Morris. (Reuters)

“CIA cooperates with law enforcement partners and does not obstruct U.S. law enforcement investigations or prosecutions,” he continued. “To the extent your letter seeks information about any ongoing federal law enforcement investigation or prosecution, the Department of Justice is the responsible agency.” 

Morris loaned Hunter Biden approximately $6.5 million — over $1 million more than initially estimated. 

Morris, who was subpoenaed to testify as part of the impeachment inquiry, said that he loaned Hunter Biden at least $5 million and began paying his tax liability. Morris and his attorney were estimating during the interview, a source told Fox News, and promised to follow-up with exact figures loaned to the first son. The attorney followed up to note an additional $1.6 million Morris had given Hunter Biden. 

Advertisement

Morris, on Oct. 13, 2021, gave Hunter Biden a loan for approximately $1.4 million. According to the letter, Hunter Biden was to repay the loan, with $500,000 paid by Oct. 1, 2026 and the remaining $417,634 by Oct. 1, 2027, plus interest.

A few days later, Morris loaned Hunter Biden $2.6 million, with directions to repay the loan by Oct. 1, 2029. That loan, according to Morris’ lawyer, “was used to pay, among other debts, Mr. Biden’s tax debt to the IRS.”

Hunter and his lawyers

Hunter Biden, center, and his attorneys Abbe Lowell, right, and Kevin Morris, left (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)

On Oct. 17, 2022, Morris loaned Hunter Biden $640,355 to be repaid by Oct. 15, 2027. In December 2022, Morris loaned Hunter $685,813.99, to be repaid by Oct. 15, 2027.

A year later, Dec. 29, 2023, Morris loaned Hunter approximately $1.2 million to be repaid by Oct. 15, 2028, with all interest paid by October 2029.

Special Counsel David Weiss charged Hunter Biden with nine federal tax charges, which break down to three felonies and six misdemeanors for $1.4 million in owed taxes that have since been paid. 

Advertisement

Weiss charged Hunter in December, alleging a “four-year scheme” in which the president’s son did not pay his federal income taxes from January 2017 to October 2020 while also filing false tax reports.

Hunter Biden pleaded not guilty to all charges.

The tax trial for the first son is set for Sept. 5. 

Advertisement

Politics

Biden donors put up $10 million in effort to compete with Trump campaign’s viral videos: report

Published

on

Biden donors put up $10 million in effort to compete with Trump campaign’s viral videos: report

President Biden’s allies have donated at least $10 million in an effort to compete against the Trump campaign’s prolific use of social media, according to a new report.

Leaders at Biden’s top re-election super PAC, Future Forward USA Action, fear that the current president is losing the viral video war to Trump and his allies, Reuters reported. Trump and his fellow Republicans have bombarded social media with videos of Biden freezing or otherwise appearing old at public events for weeks.

The Democratic super PAC boasts supporters like Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskovitz and LinkedIn founder Reed Hoffman. The effort aims to help Biden’s campaign understand how social media algorithms work, in addition to collaborating with pro-Biden influencers.

“Future Forward is around to help solve problems, and TikTok is a problem and the group is reasonably trying to solve that problem,” one Democrat source told Reuters.

BIDEN’S ‘PERPETUAL STATE OF CONFUSION’ ON DISPLAY IN NORMANDY AMID RISING COGNITIVE QUESTIONS

Advertisement

President Joe Biden speaks during a campaign event at the Martin Luther King Recreation Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, US, on Thursday, April 18, 2024. (Hannah Beier/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Since February, when the Biden campaign officially joined the TikTok platform, it has posted more than 200 times and garnered just over 380,000 followers. Trump joined TikTok barely two weeks ago but has already accumulated 6.4 million followers.

Meanwhile, the Republican National Committee has been leaning into Biden’s age issues by sharing footage of him freezing up or appearing confused at public events. 

The White House has condemned the clips as “cheap fakes,” but there is little evidence to suggest the clips have been altered in a deceptive way.

SOCIAL MEDIA MOCKS BIDEN BEING LED OFFSTAGE BY FIRST LADY

Advertisement
Donald Trump arrives to Trump Tower after being found guilty

Since February, when the Biden campaign officially joined the TikTok platform, it has posted more than 200 times and garnered just over 380,000 followers. Trump joined TikTok barely two weeks ago but has already accumulated 6.4 million followers. (Felipe Ramales for Fox News Digital)

The “cheap fakes” line has proven to be the White House’s primary defense against embarrassing videos of Biden in recent weeks.

KARINE JEAN-PIERRE DOUBLES DOWN ON ‘CHEAP FAKE’ BIDEN VIDEOS: ‘SO MUCH MISINFORMATION’

The term was used in some news articles as early as 2019, but there were significantly more this week following the videos on social media of Biden.

Not everyone is buying the explanation, however. This is all part of “election slogans and buzzwords,” according to Heritage Foundation tech researcher Jake Denton.

Biden gives gun safety remarks

The “cheap fakes” line has proven to be with White House’s primary defense against embarrassing videos of Biden in recent weeks. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

“It’s very clear what’s going on here,” Denton told Fox News Digital. “They’re trying to push a new term underneath the school of misinformation to try and pressure social media companies to take action on videos of this nature.”

Advertisement

“This kind of requires a ramp-up stage where you allege that something is a ‘cheap fake,’ or that it’s malicious in some way related to misinformation, and then you have essentially the evidence, the fact pattern, whatever, to go and push the social media companies with takedown requests, because it’s misinformation regarding an election. So to me, that’s kind of the seed that’s being planted here.”

Reuters contributed to this report.

Continue Reading

Politics

Opinion: Can the kowtowing to Trump get any worse?

Published

on

Opinion: Can the kowtowing to Trump get any worse?

It was so predictable. Speaker “MAGA Mike” Johnson belatedly did the right thing in April by allowing the House to approve aid to Ukraine over most Republicans’ opposition. Even former Speaker Nancy Pelosi called him “courageous.” Yet ever since, he’s been truckling to his fellow House right-wingers, and to Donald Trump, to make up for his perceived heresy.

Two of Johnson’s recent actions show just how low he’ll go to kowtow to the disgraced former president and his MAGA disciples in the House, and how hypocritical they all are.

Opinion Columnist

Jackie Calmes

Jackie Calmes brings a critical eye to the national political scene. She has decades of experience covering the White House and Congress.

Advertisement

On Friday, Johnson announced that the House would go to federal court to press charges against Atty. Gen. Merrick Garland for contempt of Congress. Two days earlier, the House had voted along party lines to seek the Justice Department’s prosecution of its boss. The department declined and within hours Johnson said the House would proceed on its own.

At issue is Garland’s refusal to give Republicans an audio recording they subpoenaed of President Biden’s interview last fall in the investigation of his past handling of classified documents, which didn’t result in criminal charges. Garland did provide other materials the House sought, including a transcript of the interview, but Biden asserted executive privilege over the audio.

For all the Republicans’ highfalutin posturing about respect for Congress, you know their real reason for demanding the recording: They figure the audio must include parts they can exploit to embarrass Biden. They’ve coveted it ever since the Republican special counsel who interviewed the president unnecessarily alluded in his report to Biden’s advanced age, poor memory and “diminished faculties.”

Advertisement

Johnson, on message, condemned the refusal to prosecute Garland as “another example of the two-tiered system of justice brought to us by the Biden Administration.”

Only a shameless Trump toady would keep spouting that “two tiers” nonsense after the Justice Department’s successful prosecution of Biden’s son, with a second federal trial ahead in September. And House Republicans layered on another preposterous lie: Hunter Biden’s conviction was a feint to distract us from the real crimes of the father, the ones that House Republicans haven’t been able to identify despite more than a year of investigations.

The actual double standard is Republicans’: They want Garland prosecuted for only partially complying with a congressional subpoena, yet their ranks include members who utterly scorned subpoenas from the House Jan. 6 committee to testify about their efforts to help Trump overturn the 2020 election. They even turned their defiance into fundraising pitches: “I’VE BEEN SUBPOENAED” was the Trumpian headline atop one email.

That boast came from Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, now chair of the Judiciary Committee that recommended Garland be held in contempt. Prominent among the others who flouted subpoenas was Rep. Scott Perry of Pennsylvania, who begged Trump post-election to name an acting attorney general who would declare the election fraudulent. Perry’s phone, seized by FBI agents, was rich with incriminating calls and messages (“11 days to 1/6 . . . We gotta get going!” he texted the White House at one point). And no less than the highest-ranking official within the building that was attacked, then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy of Bakersfield (“My Kevin” to Trump), also ignored his subpoena to tell what he knew.

The Jan. 6 committee, in its report, justified its extraordinary subpoenas of House members by describing “the centrality of their efforts” to help Trump illegally stay in power. For example, in December 2020, Trump named Jordan and Perry when he urged resistant Justice Department officials to “just say the election was corrupt and leave the rest to me and the Republican congressmen.”

Advertisement

The contempt for Congress is all theirs, not Garland’s.

Perry also figures in Johnson’s other recent Trump-toadying gambit. At the former president’s urging, the speaker quietly named Perry nd Rep. Ronny Jackson of Texas to the House Intelligence Committee, one of Congress’ most sensitive and least partisan panels, privy to classified information that most other lawmakers don’t see. It’s a posting that neither Perry nor Jackson deserve, which is why their appointments reportedly incensed the committee chair, Michael R. Turner of Ohio, among other more moderate House Republicans. Turner told CBS’ “Face the Nation” on Sunday that the speaker promised to intervene in the event of “improper” behavior by the two.

Why the concern? As former Rep. Adam Kinzinger, Liz Cheney’s fellow Republican profile in courage on the Jan. 6 committee, put it in a recent podcast, Perry had been the House member the committee most wanted to force to testify, because he was considered “basically the driving force behind Jan. 6” among those in Congress.

As for Jackson, he so flattered Trump when he was the White House doctor that Trump picked him to be Veterans Affairs secretary, a nomination that imploded amid allegations that Jackson drank, abused staff and improperly dispensed drugs (nickname: “Candy Man”). Demoted to captain after a Pentagon investigation, he still called himself a rear admiral on his congressional website until the Washington Post revealed his deceit in March.

A former counsel to the Intelligence Committee — a Republican — said that Perry and Jackson “couldn’t get a security clearance if they’d come through any other door.” But Johnson has put them in position to know the nation’s deepest secrets just to please Trump, who is charged himself with taking and sharing classified documents.

Advertisement

That makes sense only if your motivation isn’t the country’s interests but instead those of the once and perhaps future president. Which pretty much describes the House speaker.

@jackiekcalmes

Continue Reading

Politics

Biden campaign manager dodges question on whether immigration executive order will get president more votes

Published

on

Biden campaign manager dodges question on whether immigration executive order will get president more votes

President Biden’s campaign manager on Wednesday appeared to dodge questions about whether the president’s new executive order giving illegal immigrants a pathway to citizenship was a political move aimed at shoring up more votes before Election Day on Nov. 5. 

Julie Chavez Rodriguez appeared on CBS News’ “America Decides” for an interview with Fin Gomez that aired Wednesday evening. 

Gomez asked Rodriguez why the president’s new policy was implemented now “four and a half months out from the Nov. 5 election.”

President Biden speaks during an event marking the 12th anniversary of the Deferred Action of Childhood Arrivals program at the White House. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

Rodriguez said immigration reform has been a major priority of the Biden administration since day 1. She also bashed former President Trump for encouraging Republicans to vote against a bipartisan immigration bill earlier this year.

Advertisement

Gomez asked whether Rodriguez believed Biden’s new policy would encourage “mixed-status families” who benefit from this to vote for the president.

Rodriguez said families who are eligible for Biden’s executive order “will be able to sleep better tonight knowing that they have an opportunity to help ensure that they are not separated by cruel policies.”

VIDEO SHOWS NYPD DRAG ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT RAPE SUSPECT FROM HIDING UNDER CAR AFTER CITIZEN’S ARREST

“They will be able to hug each other a little bit tighter knowing that they can remain together as a whole family in this country as a result of this executive order. Those are the things that matter most,” Rodriguez said.

Gomez noted that many Latino voters are turning away from President Biden and asked Rodriguez to respond to critics who say the executive order is a “political move to maintain support among Latino voters.”

Advertisement
Biden DACA event

President Biden is announcing new changes to keep families together who have DACA Dreamer spouses seeking to change their immigration status. (Andrew Leyden/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

Rodriguez again invoked the president’s track record on immigration since taking office, including expanding the Affordable Care Act for recipients of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. 

At no point was the issue of border security brought up in the interview. Fox News Digital has reached out to Biden’s campaign team and the White House for additional comment.

ACCUSED MIGRANT RAPIST PASSED THROUGH BORDER HOT SPOT AT CENTER OF TEXAS-BIDEN FEUD

Biden announced Tuesday that his administration will allow U.S. citizens’ spouses without legal status to apply for permanent residency and eventually citizenship without having to first depart the country for up to 10 years. About 500,000 immigrants may benefit, according to senior administration officials.

To qualify, an immigrant must have lived in the U.S. for 10 years and be married to a U.S. citizen, both as of Monday. 

Advertisement
DEFEND DACA

Immigration rights activists take part in a rally in front of the Supreme Court in 2019. (Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images)

The Obama-era DACA program, which has shielded from deportation hundreds of thousands of people who came to the United States as young children, required applicants to be in the U.S. on June 15, 2012, and continuously for the previous five years.

More than 1 million illegal immigrants living in the U.S. are married to American citizens, according to advocacy group FWD.us, meaning hundreds of thousands won’t qualify because they were in the U.S. for fewer than 10 years.

About 50,000 noncitizen children with parents who are married to a U.S. citizen could also potentially qualify, according to senior administration officials who briefed reporters on the condition of anonymity. 

Biden also announced new regulations that will allow some DACA beneficiaries and other young immigrants to more easily qualify for long-established work visas.

Advertisement

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Continue Reading
Advertisement

Trending