How the FBI Laundered Disinformation About Hunter Biden
Alexander Smirnov, Russian Intelligence, and the Bureau’s Troubled Informant Program
An FBI informant who admitted to lying to federal agents about Hunter Biden’s dealings with a Ukrainian energy company received a six-year prison sentence last week.
Alexander Smirnov, a dual U.S. and Israeli citizen, previously pleaded guilty to making false statements to FBI agents, including a claim that then-Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter each received $5 million bribe payments in 2015 from Burisma Holdings.
Investigators later determined Smirnov’s allegations were baseless — he hadn’t even begun working with Burisma until 2017, two years after the alleged bribes. Prosecutors also allege that Smirnov has connections to Russian intelligence, suggesting his disinformation might have been part of a coordinated campaign. (While Smirnov’s bribery claims were debunked, Hunter Biden’s position on Burisma’s board raised questions about whether he leveraged his father’s name for personal gain.)
The implications of the Smirnov case are significant, exposing a systemic vulnerability within the FBI: its reliance on informants whose claims often go unverified. Smirnov’s lies, memorialized in an FBI report, became a centerpiece of Republican scrutiny. Rep. James Comer and Sen. Chuck Grassley seized on the report, using it to support an impeachment inquiry into President Biden. If Smirnov was indeed working with Russian intelligence, as the Justice Department suggests, it would mean a foreign adversary exploited one of the FBI’s longest-standing weaknesses: its informant program.
The FBI’s Informant Program
The FBI’s reliance on informants has grown exponentially over the decades. In the mid-1970s, the bureau had just 1,500 informants. By the 1980s, as the Drug War intensified, that number surged to 6,000. After 9/11, the informant ranks swelled to over 15,000. Today, there are more FBI informants than agents.
Informants play a critical role in investigations, gathering intelligence and even working undercover. However, the sheer volume of informants creates risks. They are often poorly vetted, incentivized to exaggerate or lie, and given significant latitude by agents under pressure to recruit and maintain informants. Annual reviews, which influence promotions and salary increases, emphasize the number of informants an agent handles rather than their quality — a dynamic that fosters systemic problems.
Smirnov’s case is far from unique. As just one example, consider the decade-long FBI investigation of South Florida imam Foad Farahi, which stemmed from a Trinidadian informant’s baseless claim that Farahi had ties to Al Qaeda. Despite a lack of specific evidence, agents pursued the case for years based solely on innuendo.
The FBI’s over-reliance on uncorroborated informant information doesn’t just waste time; it can be dangerous. FBI reports carry an implicit authority, even when their information is unverified. This is how false claims like Smirnov’s can escalate into political firestorms. Unverified intelligence gets memorialized, used in courts, amplified in Congress, and repeated in newsrooms. The veneer of credibility can obscure the rot beneath the information.
If Smirnov’s actions were indeed part of a Russian disinformation campaign, the irony is striking. The FBI, whose top priorities include combating foreign interference, was weaponized against itself. Smirnov exploited one of the bureau’s systemic vulnerabilities: its informant program.
More on Kash Patel and FBI Politicization
Last week, I wrote about Kash Patel, Trump’s pick to lead the FBI in a second term. Here are a few related stories worth your attention:
“Loyalty to the Trump Agenda”: Jason Leopold of Bloomberg acquired 800 pages of Patel’s emails from when he was at the Office of Director of National Intelligence. Leopold found that Patel appeared to be pushing for declassification of files based on a politicized process. The emails reveal that Patel coordinated efforts to declassify documents he believed were favorable to Trump. “His motive appeared to be convincing the public that Trump’s narrative on Russia — that it was a ‘hoax’ motivated by hatred of the president — was correct,” Leopold wrote. In other emails, Patel referred to reviewing job applicants based on their “loyalty to the Trump Agenda” — the type of statement that has fueled concerns about whether Patel would weaponize the FBI against Trump’s enemies. You can read the emails Leopold acquired here.
“Disrupt the ‘Deep State’”: Politico reports that House Oversight Chair James Comer, who helped whip up controversy around Smirnov’s false information to the FBI about Hunter Biden, plans to meet with Patel to explore ways to “disrupt the ‘Deep State.’”
“We’ve Got to Maintain Our Independence”: FBI Director Christopher Wray, who resigned shortly after Trump announced his intention to nominate Patel for the bureau’s top job, sat down for an interview with 60 Minutes. Two days earlier, Wray acknowledged concerns that the FBI could be politicized under a second Trump administration. “We’ve got to maintain our independence and objectivity, staying above partisanship and politics,” Wray said in a farewell address to FBI employees. “Because that’s what the American people expect and, I think, that’s what they deserve.”