Hunter Biden’s Lawyers Accuse Fox News of ‘Conspiracy to Defame’ Ahead of Possible Lawsuit Filing

Lawyers for Hunter Biden, the son of President Joe Biden, are calling out Fox News Channel and Fox News Digital for an alleged “conspiracy and subsequent actions to defame [Hunter] and paint him in a false light.”

The news conglomerate’s actions in question involve “the unlicensed commercial exploitation of [Hunter Biden’s] image, name, and likeness, and the unlawful publication of hacked intimate images of him,” according to NBC News, which obtained a copy of the April 23 letter sent by Biden’s legal team.

At issue, among other things, is a “mock trial” of Hunter Biden that Fox Nation (FNC’s digital platform) streamed in 2022. In addition to focusing on unproven bribery allegations, Fox Nation published “intimate images of Mr. Biden depicting him in the nude as well as engaged in sex acts,” CNN reports.

“Fox knows that these private and confidential images were hacked, stolen, and/or manipulated digital material,” the letter from Biden’s lawyers argue; further, they violate “the majority of states’ laws against the nonconsensual disclosure of sexually explicit images and videos, sometimes referred to as ‘revenge porn’ laws.”

Another recurring theme in the letter from Biden’s lawyers is Fox News’ aforementioned “bribery” narrative, which leaned heavily on the word of Alexander Smirnov, an FBI informant. In February, Smirnov was indicted by a federal grand jury for allegedly telling federal agents that back in 2017, the Ukrainian industrial conglomerate Burisma Holdings had hired Hunter Biden — to the alleged tune of $5 million — to “protect us, through his dad, from all kinds of problems.”

Though that indictment found that Smirnov’s narrative was full of “fabrications,” Biden’s lawyers write that Fox News at first “remained silent.” Then, “in a brazen show of no remorse… Fox double-downed on the debunked bribery allegation and used Smirnov’s indictment to claim this is an ‘intimidation tactic’ aimed at silencing ‘whistleblowers,’ to blame the FBI for its credulity, and to suggest an even deeper conspiracy,” per CNN.

Earlier this year, the White House similarly demanded that Fox News retract its coverage of bribery allegations against Hunter Biden, in the wake of Smirnov’s arrest.

In addition to demanding the removal of the sexually explicit images of Hunter Biden, the letter calls on Fox News to inform its readers of Smirnov’s indictment and have Fox News hosts including Sean Hannity, Maria Bartiromo and Jesse Watters “inform their viewers on air that they have been sharing a debunked allegation from a source who has been federally indicted.”

According to NBC News, Hunter Biden’s lawyers plan to sue Fox News “imminently.”

UPDATE: On Tuesday morning, Fox News Media issued a statement that reads, “Hunter Biden’s lawyers have belatedly chosen to publicly attack Fox News’ constitutionally protected coverage regarding their client. Mr. Biden is a public figure who has been the subject of investigations by both the Department of Justice and Congress, has been indicted by two different U.S. Attorney’s Offices in California and Delaware, and has admitted to multiple incidents of wrongdoing. Consistent with the First Amendment, Fox News has accurately covered these highly publicized events as well as the subsequent indictment of an FBI informant who was the source of certain claims made about Mr. Biden.”