July 20, 2023 12:57pm – Steven Nelson – New York Post
A Ukrainian-American who has been a trusted, highly credible FBI source for over a decade described four conversations with Zlochevsky
WASHINGTON — A bombshell FBI informant file describing a $10 million bribery allegation against President Biden and his son Hunter was released Thursday by Sen. Chuck Grassley, showing that a Ukrainian oligarch claimed that he was “coerced” into making the payoff.
Mykola Zlochevsky, the owner of natural gas company Burisma Holdings, told the FBI informant in 2016 while meeting at a coffee shop in Vienna, Austria, that “it cost 5 [million] to pay one Biden, and 5 [million] to another Biden,” according to the redacted FD-1023 form.
“Zlochevsky made some comment that although Hunter Biden ‘was stupid, and his (Zlochevsky’s) dog was smarter,’ Zlochevsky needed to keep Hunter Biden (on Burisma’s board) ‘so everything will be okay,’” the June 2020 document says.
The source asked whether Hunter Biden or Joe Biden told Zlochevsky he should “retain” the younger Biden; Zlochevsky allegedly replied, “They both did. ”The federal informant — a Ukrainian-American who has been a trusted, highly credible FBI source for over a decade and been paid “six figures,” according to Grassley — described four conversations with Zlochevsky, beginning with a meeting near Kyiv in late 2015 or early 2016 and continuing through a 2019 phone call.
The informant said each of his conversations with Zlochevsky occurred in the presence of a man named Alexander Ostapenko — giving the FBI a possible supporting witness. Ostapenko “introduced” the informant to Zlochevsky and “works in some office for the administration of [Ukrainian] President [Volodymyr] Zelensky,” the file says.
Zlochevsky allegedly claimed to have 17 recordings of conversations with the Bidens — two of which involved Joe — as well as “many text messages” and two documents that the informant “understood to be” financial records of “payment(s) to the Bidens.”
According to Zlochevsky, the recordings and other evidence showed he was “somehow coerced into paying the Bidens to ensure Ukraine Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin was fired,” the FBI source added.
In their final discussion, Zlochevsky allegedly told the informant over the phone that he had been an “oracle” for warning against partnering with the Bidens due to political controversy in the US.“[The informant] mentioned Zlochevsky might have difficulty explaining suspicious wire transfers that may evidence any (Illicit) payments to the Bidens,” the file says.
“Zlochevsky responded he did not send any funds directly to the ‘Big Guy’ (which [the FBI source] understood was a reference to Joe Biden). [The source] asked Zlochevsky how many companies/bank accounts Zlochevsky controls; Zlochevsky responded it would take them (Investigators) 10 years to find the records (i.e. illicit payments to Joe Biden).”
The “big guy” reference is significant because the same nickname was used to describe a tentative 10% cut for Joe Biden in 2017 as part of a partnership with Chinese-government-linked CEFC China Energy.
The moniker wasn’t publicly known until October 2020 — months after the informant file was created.At the Vienna meeting in 2016, Zlochevsky allegedly described Hunter as a conduit to his father when asked about Shokin’s investigation of Burisma.
“Zlochevsky replied something to the effect of, ‘Don’t worry Hunter will take care of all of those issues through his dad.’ [The informant] did not ask any further questions about what that specifically meant,” the file reported.
Key quotes from FBI’s Biden family informant file
Excerpts from the FBI’s confidential informant file on the Bidens, describing conversations between the informant and officials from the Ukrainian gas company Burisma:
In late 2015 or early 2016, the informant met with Vadym Pozharsky, chief financial officer of Burisma, who bragged about having Hunter Biden on the board. “They hired Hunter Biden to ‘protect us, through his dad, from all kinds or problems.’“
In 2016, the informant met with Mykola Zlochevsky, head of Burisma, shortly after Joe Biden had made a public statement about Ukraine Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin being corrupt, and that he should be removed from office.
Asked about Shokin’s investigation into Burisma: “Zlochevsky replied something to the effect of, ‘Don’t worry Hunter will take care of all of those issues through his dad.’ [The informant] did not ask any further questions about what that specifically meant.“
The informant suggested Zlochevsky hire some attorney for $50,000 to ligate the case. Zlockevsky said: “It costs 5 (million) to pay one Biden, and 5 (million) to another Biden.”
The informant asked Zlochevsky why he didn’t hire some normal US oil and gas advisers: “Zlochevsky made some comment that although ‘Hunter Biden was stupid, and his dog was smarter,’ Zlochevsky needed to keep Hunter Biden (on the board) ‘so everything will be okay.’
“The Bidens pressured him, Zlochevsky said.“Zlochevsky stated he didn’t want to pay the Bidens and he was ‘pushed to pay’ them. . . . he [said] has many text messages and ‘recordings’ that show that he was coerced to make such payments.”
Asked whether Hunter Biden or Joe Biden told Zlochevsky he should retain Hunter Biden; Zlochevsky replied:“They both did.”
Asked if he had any proof that he’d be “pressured” to pay the Bidens:“Zlochevsky said he had a total of ‘17 recordings’ involving the Bidens; two of the recordings included Joe Biden, and the remaining 15 recordings only included Hunter Biden. [The informant] reiterated that, per Zlochevsky, these recordings evidence Zlochevsky was somehow coerced into paying the Bidens to ensure Ukraine Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin was fired.”
Asked about payments:“Zlochevsky responded he did not send any funds directly to the ‘Big Guy’ (which [the informant] understood was a reference to Joe Biden). . . . Zlochevsky responded it would take them (investigators) 10 years to find the records (i.e. illicit payments to Joe Biden).”
The informant thought the story of the Burisma officials was credible. “Given the pervasive necessity to bribe government officials in Ukraine and Russia, [the informant] did not perceive Pozharsky or Zlochevsky’s statements to be unusual, self-serving, or pretextual.”
Joe Biden has publicly said that he used $1 billion in US loan guarantees as leverage to force Shokin from office, which happened in March 2016. “Well, son of a bitch. He got fired,” Biden bragged at a 2018 event hosted by the Council on Foreign Relations.Hunter Biden’s employment with Burisma emerged as a major US news story in 2019 when then-President Donald Trump was impeached for pressuring Ukraine to investigate the Bidens.
House Democrats pointed out that although Shokin’s office had investigated Burisma, evidence indicated that his firing also was sought by US allies in Europe due to his own corruption.
In addition to the prosecutor’s ouster, former White House stenographer Mike McCormick says Joe Biden advocated US support for Ukraine’s natural gas industry during a trip to Kyiv just days after Hunter quietly joined Burisma, in what he described as a clear conflict of interest.
White House spokesman Ian Sams said in a statement that “congressional Republicans, in their eagerness to go after President Biden regardless of the truth, continue to push claims that have been debunked for years and that they themselves have cautioned to take ‘with a grain of salt’ because they could be ‘made up.’”
“These claims have reportedly been scrutinized by the Trump Justice Department, a Trump-appointed US Attorney, and a full impeachment trial of the former President that centered on these very issues, and over and over again, they have been found to lack credibility,” Sams said.
“It’s clear that congressional Republicans are dead-set on playing shameless, dishonest politics and refuse to let truth get in the way. It is well past time for news organizations to hold them to basic levels of factual accountability for their repeated and increasingly desperate efforts to mislead both the public and the press.
”Hunter Biden’s legal team did not immediately respond to a request for comment.President Biden has tried to laugh off the bribery accusation, saying last month in response to a question from The Post, “Where’s the money?”
House Republicans are investigating references on Hunter Biden’s laptop to Burisma opening a Maltese bank account in 2016.
Zlochevsky has not publicly commented on the bribery allegation since it surfaced publicly on May 3, but he allegedly said in 2019 to Ukrainian-born businessman Lev Parnas, a former associate of Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani, that representatives of his company never spoke to Joe Biden.
According to a transcript provided by Parnas to Politico in 2020, Zlochevsky said, “No one from Burisma ever had any contacts with VP Biden or people working for him during Hunter Biden’s engagement.”Parnas, who broke with Trump and Giuliani in 2019, was convicted in 2021 of making illegal campaign contributions to Trump’s campaign, for which he was sentenced to 20 months in prison.
In fact, there’s evidence that then-Vice President Joe Biden met with Burisma employees. He met with his son’s partner Devon Archer in 2014 around the time both Hunter Biden and Archer joined the Burisma board, according to Obama White House visitor logs, and golfed with him later that year.
Joe Biden also met with Burisma executive Vadym Pozharskyi at an April 16, 2015, dinner at DC’s Cafe Milano, as revealed in The Post’s first bombshell report in October 2020 on the contents of Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop.
The FBI has informed members of Congress that the bribery tip was referred to the office of Delaware US Attorney David Weiss for further investigation, though it’s unclear what has been done since to determine its accuracy.
A spokeswoman for Weiss declined to comment when contacted by The Post Thursday evening.IRS supervisory agent Gary Shapley testified to the House Oversight Committee on Wednesday that federal tax agents weren’t told of the large alleged bribe amounts during their five-year investigation of Hunter for tax fraud.
“Information like this would have been really helpful to have,” Shapley said. “The team, to the best of my knowledge, never saw that [FD-1023] document.”
The informant file was created after the FBI found an earlier reference to the malfeasance in a 2017 report from the same informant, according to members of Congress involved in oversight investigations.
It’s unclear when exactly the alleged payments would have been made by Burisma, which first added Hunter Biden to its board in April 2014 as his dad assumed control of the Obama administration’s Ukraine policy. Burisma paid Hunter up to $1 million per year through 2019, apart from the alleged bribes.
Grassley (R-Iowa), who released a redacted version of the four-page document, asked in a statement, “What did the Justice Department and FBI do with the detailed information in the document? And why have they tried to conceal it from Congress and the American people for so long?”
The allegation has been the subject of intense political focus since it was first described publicly and Republican members of Congress have floated impeaching the president if supporting evidence is found.
FBI Director Christopher Wray allowed members of the House Oversight Committee to read the document last month after the bureau initially refused — sparking a brief push by panel chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) to hold Wray in contempt, which resulted in the FBI agreeing to allow legislators to read the file in a secure room at the Capitol.
Facts are facts, right out of the FBI despite their efforts to cover up all the Biden corruption. Biden is probably waiting for a bribe from Zelensky to get the F-16s. And doing business with a Russian in Ukraine is disgusting. Despite all the myths tossed around this website about political candidates THIS one is straight from the FBI documents and dispels the lies about Shokin not investigating corruption, blah blah blah… That, friends, is called facts. Not Sir Facts, lol, but just facts.
FD-1023 forms are unverified, un-investigated allegations. Note that these forms were created as part of an assessment, which Attorney General Barr assigned to Scott Brady, the U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania, to examine allegations made by Rudy Giuliani. In August 2020, after eight months of investigative efforts, Mr. Brady’s team found insufficient evidence to warrant escalating this assessment to a preliminary or full investigation, and it was closed with the concurrence of Mr. Brady and high-level DOJ officials.
Why Trump’s appointed Attorney General didn’t pursue it is the question to ask. To say that the FD-1023’s are facts is straight out of RedSquareMaiden’s imagination.
I think RedSquareMaidan has some difficulties with understanding what facts are.
If something is on Fox News or NYP, it isn’t automatically a fact. Usually quite the opposite.
What this article is missing is the connection with Joe Biden. It is basically filled in by “an informant”, not with any substantial proof.
Also often omitted is the fact that Shokin halted the investigation on Burisma before he got fired, although this article points at it although it omits that the investigation was inactive at the time.
Sacking Shokin wasn’t a good thing for Burisma.
Lastly I am a bit doubtful on the laptop that was allegedly discovered, as not more than some blurred screenshots were made public.
Hunter Biden was just being cocky and pretended to have power over his father to enrich himself, power that he didn’t seem to have as Biden did nothing that could have benefitted Burisma.
“the investigation was inactive at the time.”
Not only was it inactive – it had dealt with the Ministry of Ecology, which allegedly granted special permits to Burisma between 2010 and 2012. Hunter Biden didn’t join the company until 2014.
“Hunter Biden was just being cocky and pretended”
Hunter Biden and his uncles, James and Frank, have a lengthy record of invoking the family name to secure business deals without Joe Biden’s knowledge.
That’s complete horse shit. Where do you get your facts from MSNBC? There was no investigation as the 1023 was was reviewed in August 2020 and dropped in Dec 2020 due to your man winning the election. Stop the fuckin crap.
And let’s be perfectly clear I dislike Trump as much as I dislike dishonesty in our government. You fdemocrats put your head in the sand just hoping that all this goes away. How about an honest investigation and let the facts fall where they may. This partisan bullshit needs to stop.
They go crazy when their side is criticized and they don’t even see their hypocrisy. The one Leftist below accuses me of working for the Kremlin, lol…
Nobody’s going crazy, and there’s no hypocrisy. You posted bullshit that was dismissed years ago, and people are pointing that out. That’s different than posting about new facts.
Now, why would the NY Post recycle all that old nonsense now? Could it be because of the new target letter sent to Trump by the Justice Dept.? New Trump indictments coming out? Great economy news showing that “Bidenomics” is working? A new poll showing Biden with a 7 point lead over Trump? Or maybe all of the above?
Nobody accused you of working for the Kremlin. But the Kremlin has been pushing false information in order to hurt President Biden and get their puppet Trumpkov back in the White House. The suggestion (a facetious one, I assume) was that they would reward you for doing the same thing.
You’re repeating Republican misinformation. They lie when they claim it wasn’t investigated.
Trump’s Attorney General William Barr assigned Trump-appointed U.S. Attorney Scott Brady to head the investigation. Brady and a team of prosecutors and FBI agents conducted numerous investigative steps. After 8 months of investigation, found insufficient evidence to warrant escalating this assessment to a preliminary or full investigation, and it was closed with the concurrence of Mr. Brady and high-level DOJ officials. That was in August 2020, well before the election.
https://oversightdemocrats.house.gov/news/press-releases/after-repeated-republican-misrepresentations-about-the-form-fd-1023-ranking
That’s horse shit. It was dropped when bBarr quit. Stop spreading horse shit.
CapWillie – You wrote that “There was no investigation”; there were 8 months of investigation.
You wrote that “the 1023 was was reviewed in August 2020”, but according to the FBI, the information in the FD-1023 had previously been provided to Scott Brady and his team by Rudy Giuliani. So it was already being investigated.
You wrote that the investigation was “dropped in Dec 2020 due to your man winning the election.” Now you write that it was dropped when Barr quit. But it was closed in August; Barr didn’t resign until December. (And then, Trump appointed Jeffrey Rosen – so the replacement Attorney General was still a Trump appointee.)
You wrote, “Stop the fuckin crap.” You might want to take your own advice.
Click to access 2023-06-16.JBR%20to%20Wray-FBI%20re%20Subpoena%20Briefing%20FINAL.pdf
They are completely epileptic that someone points out Biden corruption. This is how they operate, if you disagree you have to be censored, banner, cancelled and lucky if you aren’t killed for having a differing opinion. They don’t even realize how much like Hitler and Putin they are because they are blinded by their religion.
“points out Biden corruption”
I already pointed out that Hunter Biden and his uncles, James and Frank, have a lengthy record of invoking the family name to secure business deals without Joe Biden’s knowledge.
Now, if you’re referring to *Joe* Biden corruption, nobody’s pointed out any. You posted *claims* of corruption, which were debunked years ago.
“you have to be censored, banner, cancelled and lucky if you aren’t killed”
LOL. I think the term you’re looking for is “fact-checked”.
“how much like … Putin they are because they are blinded by their religion.”
Putin is pushing lies about President Biden in order to help Trump. Who else is doing that? Hmmm…
Not everyone critical of Joe or Zelensky is automatically pro-Trump or pro-RuSSia. And i also have connections with people in RuSSia who want to get rid of Vladolf, does this make me pro-RuSSia? The intelectual level of many comments here are 2nd grade.
“Not everyone critical of Joe is automatically pro-Trump”
True, but I was replying to RSM, who comes across as strongly pro-Trump.
I’m pro-fairness.
Serious question. Is there any RW load you won’t swallow?
As “Rumors” wrote, anyone can file a form FD-1023. The reason the FBI didn’t want to release it is because it was investigated and found to be false. The reason that Grassley released it anyway is to smear President Biden, and in a desperate attempt to distract attention from a certain criminal former president and his multiple indictments.
The Burisma executive reportedly told the CHS (confidential human source) that he did not pay Joe Biden directly. He’d therefore have no way of knowing if Joe Biden got the money. So, the CHS could be lying; the Burisma executive could be lying; Hunter Biden — who was in the trough of addiction at the time — could have been lying. The document doesn’t answer the question of whether Hunter Biden told the company the truth about splitting the money with his father, or whether it was a way to shakedown additional money and appear more influential than he was. In that scenario, the Burisma executive would have believed he was bribing the vice president, yet his son would have pocketed the money.
“Vice President Joe Biden met with Burisma employees. He met with his son’s *partner* Devon Archer in 2014 around the time both Hunter Biden and Archer joined the Burisma board” (emphasis mine) – Exactly! Devon Archer and Hunter Biden were both partners in the investment firm Rosemont Seneca, before either joined the board of Burisma Holdings. So it’s quite possible that Joe Biden just knew that Devon Archer was his son’s business partner, without knowing about the Burisma connection.
Ukrainian officials have said there was no evidence the Bidens engaged in any wrongdoing.
Shokin himself has even confirmed that he was never investigating Burisma, which is all the testimony that’s needed to show that the whole thing is a farce. The truth is that Biden completely ignored how his actions might damage his son’s income in order to do the right thing in stopping corruption. And, no matter what Giuliani, Trump, or innumerable Republicans have said since then, there is not, was not, has not been, any evidence of wrongdoing by either Joe Biden or Hunter Biden in Ukraine.
These days I have no idea with the idiots running this country in Congress, the senate and executive branches as to what is fiction and what is truth. There was a time when truth and honesty transcended party affiliation. God this country has gone to shit so quickly.
Reads like sewer sludge pulled out of the plumbing by GOP wack jobs. Regardless of the truth they continue to push claims that have been debunked for yesrs. If they wanted people to take this seriously why have MTG display the Hunter pics. I could have lived a little bit happier without seeing those.
What was this so called informant doing that gave him 6 figures for over a decade? The guy he had introduce him to Zlockevsky,(if the same guy) Is an international chess champ from mafialand.
There is nothing concrete in the four page file of Joe Biden having done anything wrong. GOP insists on throwing spaghetti at the wall to see if it will stick. As Joe Biden said”Show me the money.” He has released his tax returns to be scrutinized.
Article by this guy whom graduated from “The college of William and Mary”, Quotes Ian Sam’s saying “…over and over again they have been found to lack credibility.”
The Parnas source was one that ended up being a cooperating witness who had to give over all dirt for a reduced sentence said there was no contact between Burisma and Joe Biden. FBI documents don’t always dispell lies. This whole thing only serves to divide, and who do you think benefits from that? Hmmmm But time will tell how this all plays out.
I’ve said the same many times. Generally I’ve supported all the US presidents in office and hoped they supported Ukraine since Bush 2. Things have gotten very one sided here lately and this is a very legit topic. If Biden shook down a pro-russian oligarch for a political favor while VP everyone pro-US should want to know for national security reasons. Ruzzians are very good at blackmail.
Key word “if”, I understand there are things that warrant further investigation. I would like to see Hunter do some real time for his crimes. If the committee wants to do that as well as take James who may be the real “big guy” and what’s her bucket, (I forget her name offhand) to the cleaners I could see and support that. However I believe they are letting themselves be distracted by bad actors trying to tie anything they can to President Biden. Even though I pray for our leaders I haven’t very much liked any going back to Clinton 😜. These are trying times indeed. Things are being set up in such a way that a leader that is worse than anything we have ever known will be able to manipulate, intimidate , and dominate the entire globe. God help us.
You are only amplifying people’s believe in that one side if you only post incoherent garbage from the other side, always from the same sources and every time with the same flaws and errors.
It is once again a sensationalist article that omits two crucial things: proof that Joe Biden benefitted financially and that Shokin’s sacking was helping Burisma.
This article attempts to address the first gap, but not with any substantial proof and failing to address the second gap that all of these almost identical articles have.
Posting a hundred virtual identical articles, all from Fox News of NYP with the same unresolved issues doesn’t proof your case but rather make you look pathetic.
“why have MTG display the Hunter pics”
Hunter Biden’s attorney files ethics complaint against Marjorie Taylor Greene for showing sexual images
https://thehill.com/homenews/house/4110372-hunter-bidens-attorney-files-ethics-complaint-against-marjorie-taylor-greene-for-showing-sexual-images/
If you say “JOE BIDEN CRIME FAMILY” three times he will appear.
Let’s be serious. Lots of words here, but not much else. Keep trying and maybe you will get enough idiots to believe it, and get a new president who believes Ukraine war is “territorial conflict” and remove the Biden Crime Family who believe in Ukraines sovereignty. Kremlin will priority overnight a potato to RedSquareMaiden for his efforts.