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President Trump on Friday questioned why the media did not cover Hunter Biden before the election, before again claiming that he won.
“Why didn’t the Fake News Media, the FBI and the DOJ report the Biden matter BEFORE the Election. Oh well, it’s OK, we won the Election anyway - 75,000,000 VOTES!!” the president wrote on Twitter.
Major media networks briefly addressed Hunter Biden’s announcement that his tax affairs were under investigation by the U.S. Attorney in Delaware, after largely avoiding the Hunter Biden laptop reporting from the New York Post before Nov. 3.
MEDIA FINALLY COVERS HUNTER BIDEN STORY AFTER AVOIDING CONTROVERSY BEFORE ELECTION
All three major networks' evening newscasts addressed the controversy, with "NBC Nightly News" spending the most time on the subject, clocking in at roughly one minute and 16 seconds of coverage while "CBS Evening News" came in a distant second, with roughly 45 seconds of coverage, followed by ABC's "World News Tonight" with roughly just 30 seconds.
It is not clear whether the ongoing tax probe is in any way connected to the laptop's contents.
“I learned yesterday for the first time that the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Delaware advised my legal counsel, also yesterday, that they are investigating my tax affairs,” Hunter Biden said in a statement. “I take this matter very seriously but I am confident that a professional and objective review of these matters will demonstrate that I handled my affairs legally and appropriately, including with the benefit of professional tax advisors.”
A well-placed government source told Fox News that Hunter Biden is a subject/target of a grand jury investigation. According to the source, a "target" means that there is a "high probability that person committed a crime," while a "subject" is someone you "don't know for sure" has committed a crime.
The source said President-elect Biden is not a subject of any grand jury investigation at this time.
In the waning weeks before the election, the New York Post reported on a laptop allegedly belonging to Hunter Biden and containing a record of correspondence with Ukrainian and Chinese business executives.
The alleged emails, in part, revealed that Hunter Biden allegedly introduced his father, the then-vice president, to a top executive at Ukrainian natural gas firm Burisma Holdings less than a year before he pressured government officials in Ukraine to fire prosecutor Viktor Shokin, who was investigating the company’s founder.
Members of the media dismissed the story at the time as a "baseless conspiracy theory," a "smear campaign," and "Russian disinformation."
HOW LIBERAL MEDIA TEAMED UP TO DISMISS HUNTER BIDEN STORY
Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe assured that the emails were “not part of some Russian disinformation campaign.”
The Post report revealed that Biden, at Hunter’s request, met with the executive, Vadym Pozharskyi, in April 2015 in Washington, D.C.
The meeting was mentioned in an email of appreciation, according to the Post, that Pozharskyi sent to Hunter Biden on April 17, 2015 — a year after Hunter took on his position on the board of Burisma.
“Dear Hunter, thank you for inviting me to DC and giving an opportunity to meet your father and spent [sic] some time together. It’s realty [sic] an honor and pleasure,” the email read.
However, the Biden campaign denied that then-candidate Biden had ever met with Pozharskyi. This time around, both the Biden-Harris transition and Hunter Biden himself have acknowledged the tax probe.
Two sources familiar with the investigation tell Fox News that it includes looking at the laptop purportedly belonging to Hunter Biden.
In October, Fox News first reported that the FBI subpoenaed a laptop and hard drive purportedly belonging to Hunter Biden in connection with a money laundering investigation in late 2019.
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It is unclear, at this point, whether the subpoenas came as part of the U.S. Attorney in Delaware’s investigation into Biden’s tax affairs. It is also unclear whether the FBI money laundering investigation was ongoing or directly related to Hunter Biden.
Fox News' Joey Wulfoshn contributed to this report.
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