Former FBI Officials Charged With Lying About Hunter Biden Case

Two former FBI officials were charged Friday after investigators said they lied about their ties to the bureau’s probe into Hunter Biden.

The Justice Department said 46-year-old Nikki Cole Floris of Alexandria, Virginia, and 56-year-old Bradley Benavides of Aiken, South Carolina, turned themselves in to federal authorities after both were charged with lying to Congress about their role in investigating Hunter Biden. 

“This morning two former FBI members of the now dissolved Foreign Influence Task Force, Nikki Floris and Bradley Benavides, were taken into custody – charged with allegedly lying to Congress in 2023 on matters regarding investigations related to the 2020 election,” FBI Director Kash Patel said. “As we’ve said repeatedly: weaponization will never be tolerated at this FBI.”

Both defendants were charged with making false statements in a matter within the jurisdiction of the legislative branch. The charges were filed as a result of an ongoing investigation into the FBI’s now-defunct Foreign Influence Task Force, whose stated goal entailed combating foreign influence in the 2020 election. 

Floris once made headlines after claiming she was “running a shadow government” during her role at the Foreign Influence Task Force. 

Lawyers for Floris disputed the charges.

“DOJ has accused her falsely of a crime on the say-so of politicians, not on the facts. It’s no coincidence the government is filing these nonsense charges now, years later, on the eve of an election,” her legal team said in a statement, adding that the charges were a “push a false narrative for a shot at political points.”

Prosecutors say Floris and Benavides lied to Congress about what they knew about the Biden probe based on documentary evidence, contemporaneous communications, and witness accounts.

“Floris and Benavides testified that the [Foreign Influence Task Force] was not involved in the FBI’s investigations into Hunter Biden,” the Justice Department said. “For example, Floris told the Judiciary Committee that she was involved in no discussions about Hunter Biden while she was at the FITF. Benavides testified that he only learned of the FBI’s possession of Hunter Biden’s laptop from reading a Wikipedia article in 2023.”

Floris appeared before the House Judiciary Committee on July 19, 2023 and Benavides met with lawmakers on the committee on September 28, 2023, according to a statement of facts from FBI special agent Byron Miletello. Miletello said that the evidence showed that the pair hid the Foreign Influence Task Force ties to the Hunter Biden investigations to impede congressional investigations.

U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro said the charges showed that no one is above the law.

“Lying to Congress by anyone strikes at the heart of our democratic system, but when senior FBI agents lie to Congress believing they are above the law, it’s time to bring the hammer of justice down on them,” she said. “When senior officials entrusted with safeguarding our nation’s security choose deception over duty, they undermine the very institutions they swore to uphold.”

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