On Wednesday evening, the FBI surrendered to House Republicans, signaling that it would make available to lawmakers a document that reportedly indicates President Joe Biden’s involvement in a $5 million pay-for-play scheme with an unidentified foreign national.
House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer canceled a vote scheduled for Thursday morning to hold FBI Director Christopher Wray in contempt of Congress after the agency agreed it would show the document to the entire committee.
Committee Republicans claimed victory.
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“After weeks of refusing to even admit the … record exists,” the committee said in a press release, “the FBI has caved and is now allowing all members of the Oversight and Accountability Committee to review this unclassified record that memorializes a confidential human source’s conversations with a foreign national who claimed to have bribed then-Vice President Joe Biden.”
The FBI for weeks had resisted a subpoena to produce the file. But Wray relented somewhat on Monday and provided a redacted copy and a private briefing to Comer and the committee’s top Democrat.
But House Speaker Kevin McCarthy had said it was all or nothing.
As The Free Press reported, McCarthy stated he would allow the contempt vote to proceed unless Wray provided the document to the entire committee, Democrats and Republicans.
“We have a responsibility of oversight,” he said. “If they do not comply and allow every person on oversight, Republican or Democrat — that’s their responsibility to the members of Congress — to see this document, I will move contempt charges against the director.”
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Comer said in his own statement on Wednesday, “Allowing all Oversight Committee members to review this record is an important step toward conducting oversight of the FBI and holding it accountable to the American people.”
The Oversight Committee has already revealed that the Biden family received up to $10 million in payments from firing interests, including when Biden was VP. It’s unclear if the payments were illegal, but Republicans argue that exchange shows that Biden was willing to hang a for-sale sign on his official duties.
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