Ian Patrick, FISM News
[elfsight_social_share_buttons id=”1″]
Overview
Senator Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) called out the mainstream media for their “complicit” nature in covering up the Hunter Biden laptop story that was originally broken by the New York Post in October 2020. In an interview with Fox News’s “Sunday Morning Futures” program, Johnson said that “the media is being caught in a cover-up” and they are slowly reporting the truth to get “by the moment.”
Johnson said the media is using a Watergate-style technique known as “a limited hangout” where they release bits and pieces of the data while still holding back the most important parts. Former Central Intelligence Agency official Victor Marchetti wrote in his book that media outlets do this because they “can no longer rely on a phony cover story to misinform the public.”
Digging In
Johnson and other members of the GOP have been adamantly going after Big Tech and established media like CNN and The New York Times for their reluctance to report on the Hunter Biden laptop discovered in a Delaware repair shop. Some of these outlets have even censored or suppressed the story, like when Twitter and Facebook both stripped the story off the New York Post’s accounts in 2020.
Recently, these media outlets have admitted to the authenticity of the laptop which contained emails detailing Hunter Biden’s business dealings overseas. Johnson and fellow Republican Chuck Grassley (Iowa) have started their own investigation into the Hunter Biden dealings and have been reporting to the Senate on their findings. Senator Grassley released two videos from last week, one on March 28 and the other on March 29, from his Senate speeches last week in which he details some of these findings.
Zooming Out
On October 14, 2020 the New York Post released an article on the emails and other data from the Hunter Biden laptop. The content included the younger Biden’s business dealings with Burisma, the Ukrainian energy company of which he became a board member in April 2014.
Hunter “introduced his father, then-Vice President Joe Biden, to a top executive” of Burisma “less than a year before the elder Biden pressured government officials in Ukraine into firing a prosecutor who was investigating the company,” according to the Post. Hunter’s dealings in Ukraine, which allegedly netted him and the Biden family large sums of money, would have put the elder Biden in a conflict of interest as he was then in charge of federal dealings with Ukraine.
The laptop also contained other damning evidence against Hunter Biden including images of him using different illegal drugs as well as sexually explicit material of himself. At the time, the Post noted that the FBI seized the laptop and its contents in December of 2019 but the shop owner made a copy which was obtained by the media outlet. The Post broadcasted their story less than a month before the November 2020 presidential elections, which resulted in its social media accounts being banned or heavily censored. Then-President Trump berated then-presidential candidate Joe Biden about the story during the final 2020 debate, which Biden vehemently denied at every chance.
Biblical Perspective
While Hunter Biden’s actions exemplify the life of a troubled sinner that desperately needs the love and saving grace of Jesus Christ, what Johnson and others take issue with is the lack of accountability and the success of the story’s suppression by sources we are meant to trust.
We are told in Scripture that God has a plan and that His judgment is just and final (Matthew 12:36) – but it is baffling and disheartening to see entities and people succeeding in their attempt to actively suppress something that influences leadership in the United States. In fact, a recent poll from Media Research Center said that among voters who were unaware of various scandals surrounding Joe Biden, 17% would have voted differently.
Thankfully as Christians, our confidence is in the leadership of Christ and God’s plan and not just in the leaders of this world. We also know that God’s plan is so complex and divine that no one can claim to know it (Ecclesiastes 8:17). In fact, Ecclesiastes tells us further in chapter 8 verse 14 that “there are righteous people to whom it happens according to the deeds of the wicked, and there are wicked people to whom it happens according to the deeds of the righteous.”
Despite the world seemingly rewarding ill-gotten gains, we can continue to trust that God reigns sovereign and supreme above the actions of men.
———————————————————————————————————————————News in Four is a segment of FISM News that breaks down stories in four easy to digest segments and can be read in four minutes or less. While these articles are meant to provide a biblical perspective to current events, FISM News does not intend to hold these perspectives as absolute truth, knowing that the news is often nuanced and politically driven. While our goal is to provide a jumping off point to view the news through a biblical lens, God has called all believers, like Bereans, to search the Bible for oneself (Acts 17:11-12).