Donald Trump really, really wants the 2020 electionâs âOctober Surpriseâ to be Hunter Biden. For years, his fixer Rudy Giuliani has been circling the globe in search of dirt on Hunter and his father Joe Biden. Now Trump and his team are hoping that they can use it to change the subject in an election that thus far has been dominated by Trumpâs mishandling of the coronavirus pandemic.
The backstory of how Giuliani ended up with Hunterâs hard drive is fishy, to say the least. The Post says that a laptop with a Beau Biden Foundation sticker on it was left for repairs at a Delaware computer repair shop in 2019 and never retrieved. The store owner, a Trump supporter who told reporters he is âlegally blind,â couldnât confirm it was Hunter Biden who dropped off said laptop. But this owner subsequently examined the hard drive, made a copy of it, and sent it to ⌠Rudy Giuliani. The Post says it was initially tipped off to the existence of the drive by former Trump adviser Steve Bannon, who is currently facing criminal charges for fraud.
The hard drive purportedly contained a âsmoking gunâ email, as the Post described it, in which a Burisma executive thanked Hunter Biden for âthe opportunity to meet your father.â The Postâs story includes what it claims is a screenshot of the email, which like all of the other data on the hard drive has not been independently vetted.
Giuliani, in his way, has undercut the authenticity of the story: âEven if it isnât accurate, the American people are entitled to know it.â Nevertheless, the president has tweeted that it is âa proven fact, and cannot be deniedâ that the story is legitimate. His allies have since used the story as a springboard to explore or outright fabricate several other conspiracy theories related to Biden and his son Hunter. Giuliani and Donald Trump, Jr. have gone so far as to allege that the purported Hunter Biden hard drive also contained child pornography. There is nothing even resembling evidence that this is true.
