Republicans on the House Oversight Committee are answering the calls from their Democratic counterparts to release the transcripts of interviews conducted as part of the panel's investigation into Hunter Biden.
Committee Chairman James Comer has released House Republicans' transcribed interview with a former Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) supervisory special agent, whose account he said substantiates testimony from Internal Revenue Services (IRS) whistleblower Gary Shapley about how the Secret Service thwarted an attempt to interview the president's son.
"IRS whistleblower Gary Shapley's testimony that Secret Service headquarters and the Biden transition team were tipped off is confirmed by a former FBI agent," Comer said in a Monday press release. "Shapley and the FBI agent planned to interview Hunter Biden in December 2020, but learned the night before that the Biden transition team was tipped off. They were told to not approach Hunter Biden and wait for his call. That never happened, and they never got to interview Hunter Biden."
Representative Jamie Raskin, the ranking Democrat on the oversight committee, has called for the transcript's release for weeks, suggesting that House Republicans were withholding the document to distort the narrative about the evidence that they've claimed to have obtained against Hunter Biden.
"In refusing to release the transcript of the former FBI Supervisory Special Agent's interview, you have advanced a false, distorted, and grossly incomplete narrative based on cherry-picked facts and deprived the American people of the opportunity to come to their own conclusion in light of all the evidence," Raskin wrote in a July 28 letter to Comer.
The Democrat criticized the chairman for his failure to release the transcript of the July 17 interview, saying that it was part of a larger "troubling pattern of concealing key evidence," including an alleged copy of the hard drive from Hunter Biden's missing laptop and transcripts from witnesses who appeared before the committee.
A spokesperson for Raskin referred Newsweek to Democratic leadership on the committee for comment. Newsweek reached out to the Oversight Committee via email for comment.
The transcript released on Monday shows that the former FBI supervisory special agent, whose name was redacted, testified that the evening before he and Shapley were planning to show up at Hunter Biden's home for a possible interview and consent search, FBI headquarters had contacted the Secret Service.
The agent, who described feeling "frustrated" said, "I believe that the Secret Service had to be notified for our safety, for lack of confusion, for deconfliction, which we would do in so many other cases, but I didn't understand why the initial notification."
He said he was instructed to stay away from Hunter Biden's home until contacted by the president's son, something he had never been asked to do before, but that he never heard from Hunter and, thus, never interviewed him.
However, the agent also noted that, as an attorney, Hunter would have been a more difficult witness to obtain an interview from and that, under FBI policy, "high profile" matters involving politically-sensitive people "require greater lines of approval up the chain of command."
Last week's appointment of U.S. Attorney for Delaware David Weiss, the Trump appointee who is overseeing the Hunter Biden investigation, as special counsel in the probe has been heavily criticized by Republicans, who initially wanted Weiss to be elevated to the role but are now upset about the allegations that IRS and FBI whistleblowers have made about his handling of the case.
"The Oversight Committee has no confidence in U.S. Attorney Weiss as Special Counsel given his inability to prevent the Biden transition team from being contacted and federal agents were not permitted to interview Hunter Biden as planned," Comer said on Monday.
Update 08/17/23 3:04 p.m. ET This story was updated with comments from Raskin.
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
About the writer
Katherine Fung is a Newsweek reporter based in New York City. Her focus is reporting on U.S. and world politics. ... Read more
