The latest Twitter documents revealed that the CIA had sent out warnings about a book alleging that Joe and Hunter Biden had engaged in corruption in Ukraine.
Following a breakdown of what led to Twitter’s collaboration with the FBI, journalist Matt Taibbi detailed in his latest Twitter Files Dump how this partnership has allowed the agency to become the “belly button” to handle the demands of the FBI filter government.
Among those demands was a message from the CIA warning of a new book by former Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin containing allegations of corruption by the US government, particularly the Bidens.
“We take it with great confidence that by the summer of 2020 members of a Russian influence organization, at least partially directed by Russian intelligence, were aware of a production schedule related to an upcoming book,” the message reads.
“Although it is currently unclear to what extent Russian intelligence might have been involved in the creation or promotion of this book, it is known that it directed the same influential organization to disseminate similar information in previous operations.”
The latest treasure trove from the Twitter files revealed that the CIA had sent out warnings about a book alleging that Joe and Hunter Biden (above) were involved in corruption in Ukraine
In “True Stories of Joe Biden’s International Corruption in Ukraine,” deposed former Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin repeated allegations of alleged wrongdoing by the Bidens
It’s unclear if Twitter took any action against the book, with Shokin’s claims debunked amid intense scrutiny of the Bidens’ alleged conflict of interest
It’s unclear if Twitter took any action against the book True Stories of Joe Biden’s International Corruption in Ukraine.
Shokin was Ukraine’s chief prosecutor from 2015 to 2016, before he was sacked for allegedly ignoring corruption.
His book reiterates his claims that Burisma, a Ukrainian energy company of which Hunter Biden was a board member, paid Hunter millions of dollars to prevent prosecutors from cracking down on corruption at the company.
He further claimed that Joe Biden himself ordered Shokin’s dismissal before he could solve the case. However, reports indicated that Hunter was never involved in an investigation.
Though Hunter’s role at Burisma raised concerns of a conflict of interest at the time, the corruption allegations have since been debunked, despite claims to the contrary by Donald Trump’s attorney Rudy Giuliani, who reportedly admitted earlier this year that he had failed to investigate dirt on the Bidens.
The new Twitter files also revealed that the social media company had a dispute with the State Department’s Global Engagement Center (GEC) in February 2020.
According to the internal memos, the fledgling secret service has reported the spread of Russian and Chinese misinformation about the coronavirus.
The GEC singled out accounts as “Russian personas and proxies” who “describe the coronavirus as an engineered bioweapon,” blamed “research conducted at the Wuhan Institute” and “attributed the emergence of the virus to the CIA.”
When Twitter tried to crack down on access to former Trust and Safety head Yoel Roth, who was busy coordinating requests from intelligence agencies, the GEC decided to go public with their own findings of misinformation.
Along with a list of 5,500 accounts that the GEC claimed were amplifying Chinese propaganda and disinformation about COVID, the agency released a list of nearly 250,000 such accounts to the public, much to Twitter’s dismay.
“Roth saw GEC’s move as an attempt by GEC to use information from other agencies to fit into the content moderator club, which includes Twitter, Facebook, the FBI, DHS, and others,” Taibbi wrote.
The Twitter files also showed that former security chief Yoel Roth (above) was attempting to undermine the Trump administration’s agency by exposing misinformation
Internal memos show the FBI’s willingness to serve as a funnel for intelligence agencies
The FBI would essentially act as a “belly button” to relay requests between intelligence agencies and social media companies
After the fallout, the Twitter documents show that the FBI warned the company that the GEC wanted to participate in the industry talks between social media and intelligence leaders.
However, Roth appeared reluctant to allow the GEC to join because the agency, then operating under the Trump administration, was too political, unlike the FBI and Department of Homeland Security, which Roth described in a May 6, 2020 report as ” apolitical” email.
“I think they thought the FBI was less Trumpy,” a former Defense Department official told Taibbi.
Roth also suggested in an email the following month that bringing the GEC to the table would pose “major risks” as the 2020 election heats up.
When the GEC and other agencies tried to provide more input, the FBI came in and offered to serve as “conduits” for the rest of the intelligence community.