‘Allegations are not facts’: CNN host Jake Tapper shreds FBI informant charged with lying about Joe Biden’s role in Ukrainian deal
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: CNN host Jake Tapper expressed astonishment upon learning that Alexander Smirnov, a former FBI informant, faced charges for allegedly deceiving the Bureau regarding President Joe Biden's purported involvement in questionable business dealings with Ukrainian energy company Burisma Holdings.
Smirnov, whose claims were invoked by Republican lawmakers during the impeachment inquiry into Joe Biden, was apprehended on February 15 and accused of "lying to the FBI and creating false records".
CNN correspondent Evan Perez talks about FBI's allegations
Correspondent Evan Perez said, "What the FBI now says and what David Weiss, the special counsel, who has charged Hunter Biden in two separate cases in Delaware and in Los Angeles, this case is being brought by David Weiss against this informant."
He added, "What they're saying is that all of that was false and that he is now facing these charges of false statements and creating a false and fictitious document. Those are the two charges that he's facing now in Los Angeles, Jake."
Responding to the breaking news on his program 'The Lead', Tapper emphatically stated, "This was the individual that he had been told by somebody who ran Burisma that Joe Biden himself was going to get $5 million for all these shady dealings."
He continued, "This is the guy that Senator Chuck Grassley was insisting that this FBI report be revealed to the public. This was the guy who basically provided hours’ worth of content on Fox, especially in primetime."
"This was the guy who James Comer, the guy who runs the House Oversight Committee, was relying on as a major source of information, and the FBI is saying, 'The guy’s a liar, in fact so much so we’re charging him with a crime'," he further added.
Tapper compares current situation to Kavanaugh allegations
CNN's senior justice correspondent Perez chimed in, affirming, "Correct, Jake. I mean look, again, what the Republicans are saying is that one of the reasons why they were relying on him is that they believed he was credible, that the FBI was using him as an informant, and that that gave him credibility."
He elaborated, "What we’re seeing though in these documents in this indictment is that all of that was fictitious. He came up with this story after Joe Biden became the presumptive candidate for the Democrats in 2020."
Tapper then drew a comparison between the current situation and the numerous allegations leveled against Brett Kavanaugh during his nomination process for the Supreme Court in 2018.
“It reminds me to a degree of during the Brett Kavanaugh hearings when all these people were making wild allegations, false allegations about the man that is now Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh,” Tapper noted.
“And then there was this move to just like release all this information. Well, allegations are not facts, and just because somebody has reported something to the FBI doesn’t mean it’s true," he continued.
"And we saw all these wild stuff released about Brett Kavanaugh who was unfairly smeared by a lot of this. Here we have apparantly the same situation, except it's against Joe Biden."
