Senior FBI Agent Tied To Hunter Biden Probe Resigns After Lawmaker's Criticisms - Reports

A senior FBI official resigned from his post late last week following criticism from Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley over alleged improper conduct regarding federal probes into presidential family member Hunter Biden, CBS News reported on Tuesday

WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 30th August, 2022) A senior FBI official resigned from his post late last week following criticism from Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley over alleged improper conduct regarding Federal probes into presidential family member Hunter Biden, CBS News reported on Tuesday.

Timothy Thibault retired from the FBI headquarters in Washington, D.C. after recently being removed from his role as assistant special agent in charge at the Washington Field Office, two US officials reportedly confirmed.

However, Thibault had also reached retirement age, and it is standard at the FBI to hand over one's badge and receive an escort out of the building upon retirement, the officials also said.

In July, Grassley criticized Thibault and other federal investigators over alleged impropriety in regards to the federal probe of Biden, namely purported attempts to diminish the investigation. Grassley cited whistleblowers who approached a senior Republican and accused officials such as Thibault of trying to downplay negative information about Biden and label it as uncredible.

"Mr. Thibault's blatant partisanship undermined the work and reputation of the FBI. This type of bias in high-profile investigations casts a shadow over all of the bureau's work that he was involved in, which ranged from opening an investigation into Trump based on liberal news articles to shutting down investigative activity into Hunter Biden that was based on verified information," Grassley said in a statement in response to Thibault's resignation.

Biden reportedly abandoned his laptop at a computer repair shop in 2019 while his father, then-presidential candidate Joe Biden, was in the middle of his campaign. The contents of the laptop, which included lewd photographs and depictions of drug use, later became public.

Emails obtained from the laptop related to foreign business dealings with China and Ukraine have also drawn criticism.

The chief of Facebook (banned in Russia as an extremist organization) on Thursday said that the FBI contacted the social media platform to alert them about an alleged "Russian propaganda" story for which to be on alert shortly before the publication of the Biden laptop story. The platform decreased distribution of the story as a result, according to Mark Zuckerberg.

Zuckerberg's comments drew further criticism of the FBI and their handling of the Biden probe, with lawmakers including House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy alleging that the FBI "colluded with Big Tech" to silence the story in an attempt to control information before an election.