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The Wall Street Journal editorial board blasted the former intelligence officials and Secretary of State Antony Blinken who orchestrated the infamous Hunter Biden disinformation letter shortly before the 2020 election, also calling out "complicit media."
"Intelligence officials, former as well as current, have a particular duty not to spread disinformation because they have access to classified information that the public can’t check. The press overwhelmingly went along with the false Biden campaign claims because it wanted Mr. Biden to win. These 51 officials have done more to damage the credibility of the CIA and FBI than anything Donald Trump has said. Ditto for the complicit media," the editorial board members wrote.
Former CIA Deputy Director Michael Morrell testified before the House Judiciary and Intelligence Committees, and revealed that Blinken was "the impetus" of the public statement signed by intelligence officials in 2020.
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, and House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Turner, R-Ohio, sent Blinken, who served as a senior adviser to Biden's campaign in 2020, a letter on Thursday explaining Morell's testimony.
President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter Biden, step off Air Force One, Saturday, Feb. 4, 2023, at Hancock Field Air National Guard Base in Syracuse, N.Y. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)
"In his transcribed interview, Morell testified that on or around October 17, 2020 you reached out to him to discuss the Hunter Biden laptop story," Jordan and Turner wrote in the letter to Blinken.
"According to Morell, although your outreach was couched as simply gathering Morell's reaction to the Post story, it set in motion the events that led to the issuance of the public statement," they wrote.
Morell did not intend on making this statement before Blinken's call, according to the letter.
"There were two intents. One intent was to share our concern with the American people that the Russians were playing on this issue; and, two, it was to help Vice President Biden," he testified.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken testifies to the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Thursday, March 23, 2023, on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Over 50 intelligence officials signed a letter in 2020 that stories about the Hunter Biden laptop were "Russian disinformation." Many of them were open Biden supporters.
James Clapper, the former director of intelligence who signed the letter in 2020, accused Politico in February of "deeply distorting" the letter.
Then-Politico reporter Natasha Bertrand obtained the letter for a story headlined, "Hunter Biden story is Russian disinfo, dozens of former intel officials say," just weeks before the 2020 election.
Former Director of National Intelligence (DNI) James Clapper departs from a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing evaluating the Intelligence Community Assessment on "Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent US Elections" on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., May 16, 2018. (REUTERS/Joshua Roberts)
"There was message distortion," Clapper told The Washington Post's Glenn Kessler. "All we were doing was raising a yellow flag that this could be Russian disinformation. Politico deliberately distorted what we said. It was clear in paragraph five."
The WSJ editorial board wrote that the public deserved answers and added the media did "precisely" what Blinken wanted.
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"Statement signers like former Obama director of national intelligence James Clapper have since admitted they had no evidence to make their disinformation claims, and Mr. Clapper claims the media ‘distorted’ their views. No, the press did precisely what Mr. Blinken and the 51 spooks wanted: Use their letter to discredit the Hunter laptop and the information on it that raised questions about the Biden family business with foreigners," the editors wrote.
Fox News' Brooke Singman contributed to this report.
Hanna Panreck is an associate editor at Fox News.
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