Ex-FBI officials accused of false statements about Hunter Biden press
for dismissal of charges
[October 30, 2026]
By ERIC TUCKER
WASHINGTON (AP) — Defense lawyers urged a federal judge Thursday to
dismiss a criminal complaint charging two former FBI officials with
making false statements to Congress about Hunter Biden, calling the case
an overtly political prosecution aimed at placating President Donald
Trump.
The arguments capped a days-long hearing in which lawyers for the former
officials, Nikki Floris and Bradley Benavides, sought to cast the case —
one in a series of high-profile Justice Department actions before next
week's midterm voting — as legally defective and tainted by politics.
The hearing included testimony that the investigation was ordered by FBI
Director Kash Patel and that it was opened on the heels of a primetime
election security speech by Trump in which the Republican rehashed
long-running grievances about his 2020 election loss to Democrat Joe
Biden.
“A political prosecution is always going to make for a shaky foundation
for a criminal case,” said Mary Dohrmann, a lawyer for Floris. She,
along with Benavides, is accused of falsely downplaying their knowledge
of a laptop that the Justice Department says Hunter Biden dropped off at
a computer repair shop in 2019 and that was publicized a year later in a
revelation that shook the final weeks of the presidential race.
A key decision looms next week
U.S. Magistrate Judge Zia Faruqui did not immediately rule on the
defense lawyers' request.
A dismissal of the complaint would not prevent the Justice Department
from attempting to get an indictment, but that could be a challenge
given that grand juries in the nation's capital have repeatedly refused
to approve charges in politically sensitive cases. Even if the judge
sustains the complaint, prosecutors would presumably still need to
secure a grand jury indictment for the case to proceed.
The alleged false statements were made in 2023 before the House
Judiciary Committee as the Republican-led panel was conducting its own
investigation into Hunter Biden. The complaint alleges that though the
two officials downplayed their knowledge about the laptop, both
participated in numerous discussions about it.
A Justice Department prosecutor, James Kirkpatrick, argued Thursday that
the two officials — both leaders of a since-disbanded FBI task force set
up to monitor foreign influence in elections — had a motive to minimize
their knowledge about Hunter Biden and the laptop given that his father
was president at the time of the questioning.
Kirkpatrick suggested the two may have been leery of discussing Hunter
Biden and the laptop since, he said, the task force did not publicly
correct a narrative from some Democrats and former intelligence
officials that the laptop might have been connected to Russian
disinformation. Trump's then-intelligence director, John Ratcliffe, said
after the laptop was publicized that there were no signs of foreign
involvement in any way.
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“At the end of the day, the FITF got it wrong,” Kirkpatrick said,
referring to the Foreign Intelligence Task Force. “They didn’t quash the
narrative that this laptop was the product of Russian disinformation.
They didn't correct the record.”
Defense lawyers insisted that their clients did not lie and had no
incentive to do so, and that any potentially false statement was not
intentional and would have been the product of vague questioning or a
faulty memory.
“There is absolutely zero proof that Mr. Benavides knew and remembered
and misled. They have to prove that the statements were made
intentionally and not the result of confusion, mistake, faulty or other
innocent reasons," said Ron Safer, a lawyer for Benavides.
Safer disputed the prosecution’s suggestion of a motive, arguing that
the Foreign Influence Task Force — which was shuttered by the Trump
administration last year — never made an assessment on the authenticity
of the laptop.
The FBI director was said to be keenly interested in the
investigation
The case was filed more than a week before the midterm elections in an
unusual mechanism. The Justice Department charged the two via a criminal
complaint — which is more often used for instances when officials need
to swiftly take someone into custody — rather than a grand jury
indictment.
The hearing this week featured startling testimony from Bryan Witt, an
FBI special agent who investigated the case. He said he regarded it as a
“huge distraction” from his other work and appreciated that the
investigation could be seen as political. He said that Patel had
mandated the investigation and taken an unusual interest in it,
requesting and receiving regular updates about it.
He also testified that the FBI had been directed to investigate Floris
after a July primetime speech in which Trump amplified debunked theories
about his 2020 election loss.
Among the grievances the White House raised at the time was a disputed
FBI intelligence report about an alleged effort by China to influence
the election on Biden's behalf. The memo was recalled after the FBI
concluded that the information was not sufficiently corroborated. Floris
has long been singled out for criticism from Trump's Republican allies
for her role in that recall decision.
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