The FBI pressured Twitter to suppress The Post’s blockbuster scoop about Hunter Biden’s laptop by warning it could be part of a Russian “hack and leak” operation — even while knowing the concern was unfounded, according to internal company records made public Monday.
The latest release of the “Twitter Files” authorized by new owner Elon Musk also provided more examples of former top FBI lawyer Jim Baker’s role in cracking down on The Post’s reporting while he worked as Twitter’s deputy general counsel, a job from which Musk fired him earlier this month.
Documents posted on Twitter by independent journalist Michael Shellenberger showed that Twitter’s former head of trust and safety, Yoel Roth, was contacted by FBI Agent Elvis Chan just hours before The Post published the first laptop story on Oct. 14, 2020.
Chan used a special, one-way communication channel to send Roth and at least one other person 10 documents on the night of Oct. 13, 2020, and asked them to confirm receipt, Shellenberger found.
Approximately two-and-a-half hours earlier, Hunter Biden attorney George Mesires had called and emailed Delaware computer repair shop owner John Paul Mac Isaac after learning from The Post that the first article based on files recovered from the abandoned laptop would be published the next day.
“I am a lawyer for Hunter Biden and I appreciate you reviewing your records on this matter,” Mesires wrote to Mac Isaac.
At 5 a.m. on Oct. 14, The Post published the first of many scoops exposing questionable overseas business dealings conducted by Hunter Biden — details of which were hidden in plain sight on the hard drive of his laptop.
Mac Isaac had tipped off the FBI about criminal evidence on the laptop, and the feds confiscated the computer back in December 2019. Nine months later, having heard nothing from investigators, Mac Issac gave a copy of the laptop to Trump lawyer Rudy Guiliani.
Giuliani, in turn, supplied The Post with the trove of damning content.
But The Post’s story was suppressed by Facebook and Twitter, which temporarily banned the outlet in the wake of its publication. It was also ignored or discredited by mainstream outlets, many of whom quietly substantiated the report months later.
