October 22, 2020

Wyden and Schumer: FBI Must Not Launch Political Investigations to Influence the Election

Succumbing to Pressure from Trump to Investigate Vice President Biden’s Family Would Undermine National Security, Credibility of Law Enforcement and Do Irreparable Harm to U.S. Democracy

Washington, D.C. – The FBI must reject pressure from Donald Trump to announce investigations of Joe Biden or his family to influence the presidential election, or else it risks doing lasting harm to our democracy and national security, Senate Intelligence Committee member Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Senate Democratic Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., wrote in a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray.

Following a widely questioned article in the New York Post, that alleged to have obtained stolen Hunter Biden emails from the president’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani, Donald Trump has publicly called for investigations of Vice President Biden and his son.

“We are deeply concerned about the possibility that in response to these reports the Trump Administration will take actions before Election Day that would seek to damage the Democratic presidential candidate and undermine the rule of law,” Wyden and Schumer said.

Giuliani has worked for months to spread false and misleading allegations about the Biden family, including working with Russian asset Andrii Derkach, who has been sanctioned by the United States for interfering in the U.S. election. 

“The FBI has a critical role to play in safeguarding our elections and, in partnership with the Intelligence Community, is responsible for exposing and combating both foreign cyber and influence efforts targeting our electoral process,” the senators continued.

“In carrying out this critical national security mission, law enforcement’s handling of this matter must be above politics and beyond reproach. I therefore urge you to resist pressure from President Trump and other partisan actors to take any actions intended to benefit President Trump politically on the eve of the election. Succumbing to such pressure would deeply undermine our national security interests and the credibility of law enforcement, and could have devastating consequences for the resiliency of our democracy.” 

Read a PDF of the letter here.

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