As we move into the final week before the 2020 presidential election we find ourselves in a place not unlike the end of the 2016 election. Rudy Giuliani announced over the weekend that he possessed a laptop given to him by a Delaware computer repairman containing damning emails from the Biden family. An ex-business partner of Hunter Biden, Tony Bobulinski alleged that former Vice President Joe Biden was part of discussions around his son’s efforts to form an investment venture with a Chinese oil company. Bobulinski said he is the CEO of Sinohawk Holdings, which he explained "was a partnership between the Chinese operating through Chairman Ye and the Biden family." He said he was brought on as CEO by Hunter Biden and James Gilliar, who was listed as the sender of several emails. The allegations against Joe Biden are that the Biden family regularly leveraged their family name to make millions in China and Ukraine during Biden's Vice Presidency. It is also claimed that Joe Biden received a cut of these earnings while in office and regularly advised Hunter Biden on which deals to make. An email includes a note that “Hunter has some office expectations he will elaborate.” A proposed equity split references “20” for “H” and “10 held by H for the big guy?” with no further details. The reference to "the big guy" is alleged to be Joe Biden.
After the New York Post published the emails reportedly belonging to Hunter Biden, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Representative Adam Schiff (D-California) claimed that the information was not legitimate and that it was part of a Russian disinformation scheme. Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe pushed back against this claim, saying "there is no intelligence that supports that." The most important question in everyone's mind is, are these emails legitimate? The timing of the release of this information is certainly nothing new. The dreaded "October surprise" in election cycles is always a given. However, the source of this surprise is where we really need to focus our attention. Should the emails prove to be true the Department of Justice and the Senate will decide appropriate action and ultimately determine if Joe Biden was involved in these activities while acting as Vice President of the United States. If the emails are a scheme drawn up by the Trump campaign in a last effort to rally against Biden right before the election; then we will see the continuation of an unfortunate trend in American political muckraking. The real danger however comes if this is indeed a deliberate misinformation campaign. During the last presidential debate on October 22nd Joe Biden claimed that Russia and Iran have already been confirmed to be actively interfering in U.S. elections. Biden claimed that Russia played a significant role in 2016 and that American voter registration information has already been compromised this year. When asked what he would do in response to this he said that nations found interfering in U.S. elections would "pay the price." Trump has also expressed concern over the election and famously proclaimed that he would not accept defeat if he suspected foreign interference and would launch a comprehensive investigation into the matter. U.S. national security policy may be forever changed by the outcome of the 2020 election. This known interference may push the intelligence community further online and force them to look at how other nations can affect domestic politics and policy by influencing public opinion with false, partial or targeted information.
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