The material raised questions about alleged Biden family influence-peddling weeks before the 2020 US election
US journalist Tucker Carlson has said that people linked to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu approached him with material from Hunter Biden’s laptop ahead of the 2020 US presidential election.
The laptop belonging to the son of then-presidential candidate Joe Biden became the focus of a major controversy weeks before the vote after the New York Post published material from it pointing to alleged influence-peddling involving the Biden family. The story was widely questioned by US media at the time, while dozens of former intelligence officials suggested it bore the hallmarks of a Russian information operation.
Speaking to RT’s Rick Sanchez on Wednesday, Carlson recalled that he was working at Fox News at the time and said he sent one of his producers to meet a person connected to Netanyahu.
“People connected to Netanyahu came to us,” he said, adding that they claimed to have information from Hunter Biden’s laptop.
“It was the Israelis who were pushing that,” Carlson said, referring to the laptop allegations. “They called me.”
Carlson said he believed the material from the laptop had been circulating before the device was reportedly left at a Delaware computer repair shop and suggested that somebody had obtained it from cloud storage.
Asked who originally obtained it, Carlson said he did not know. “Some people claim it was the Russian security services that did that. Maybe. I have no idea.” he said.
Carlson went on to suggest that Netanyahu did not want Joe Biden to win the 2020 election, pointing to the Israeli leader’s close relationship with Donald Trump. He characterized the episode as Israeli interference in US politics.
The laptop scandal erupted in October of 2020, weeks before the US presidential election, when a Delaware computer repair technician released copies of a hard drive containing emails suggesting foreign influence peddling by the Biden family. The New York Post was the first outlet to publish the story.
Thereafter, CNN published an analysis titled ‘The anatomy of the New York Post’s dubious Hunter Biden story.’ Talking heads and hosts frequently asked if Donald Trump was spreading ‘Russian disinformation’ by bringing up the scandal during presidential debates.
Politico published a breaking story of a letter from 51 intelligence officials, running the headline: ‘Hunter Biden story is Russian disinfo, dozens of former intel officials say’.
The Washington Post published multiple opinion pieces downplaying the scandal, while the New York Times published an article titled ‘Trump Had One Last Story To Sell. The Wall Street Journal Wouldn’t Buy It’. US federal broadcaster NPR refused to cover the story at all, while the British Guardian published pieces criticizing social media platforms for allowing the story to circulate, citing “likely misinformation.”
The authenticity of significant amounts of data from the laptop was subsequently confirmed by major US news organizations, including the NYT and WaPo, reversing their initially dismissive stances.
