Judicial Watch Sues FBI for Records on Hunter Biden Gun Scandal

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced today that it filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit for FBI records about the gun owned by Hunter Biden that reportedly was thrown in a trash can behind a Delaware grocery store (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of Justice (No. 1:23-cv-00920)).

Judicial Watch filed suit after the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) withheld records in response to a January 30, 2023, FOIA request for:

• All records, including investigative reports, telephone logs, witness statements, memoranda, and firearms purchase documentation, related to the reported purchase, possession, and disposal of a firearm owned by Hunter Biden discarded in a Delaware trash receptacle circa October 2018.
• All records of communications of FBI officials regarding the reported purchase, possession, and disposal of the firearm.

In a separate lawsuit, Judicial Watch received records from the United States Secret Service that implicate the FBI in the unusual action to help Hunter Biden.

Included in those records is a response to a February 2021 email inquiry from Politico reporter Ben Schreckinger regarding the Secret Service’s involvement in the investigation of the Hunter Biden gun incident, the Communications Department asks for “more information or documentation.” Schreckinger responds: “Sure thing. Agents visited StarQuest Shooters & Survival Supply and asked to take possession of the paperwork Hunter had filled out to purchase a gun there. The FBI also had some involvement in the investigation.”

Also in those records is a March 2021 email from New York Post reporter Lorena Mongelli, who reached out to the Secret Service Communications Office, asking for comment on text messages on Hunter Biden’s lost laptop:

It appears the text messages were sent from Hunter Biden in which he indicates that the Secret Service did in fact respond to the Oct. 23, 2018 [gun] incident. This information contradicts your previous statement relating to the incident and we would like to know whether the Secret Service would like to respond to these new findings.

A person from the Communications Office, whose name is redacted replies: “We have received your inquiry, would you be able to provide copies of these alleged text messages for reference?”

Mongelli responds:

The Daily Mail actually posted copies of the same text messages the NY Post is referencing. This is what one text message says:

“She stole the gun out of my trunk lock box and threw it in a garbage can full to the top at Jansens [sic]. Then told me it was my problem to deal with,” Hunter wrote.

“Then when the police the FBI the secret service came on the scene she said she took it from me because she was scared I would harm myself due to o my drug and alcohol problem and our volatile relationship and that she was afraid for the kids.”

In October 2020, The Blaze reported that in October 2018, Hunter Biden’s handgun was taken by Hallie Biden, the widow of then-presidential nominee Joe Biden’s son Beau. In 2021, Politico reported:

Hallie took Hunter’s gun and threw it in a trash can behind a grocery store, only to return later to find it gone.

Delaware police began investigating, concerned that the trash can was across from a high school and that the missing gun could be used in a crime, according to law enforcement officials and a copy of the police report obtained by POLITICO.

But a curious thing happened at the time: Secret Service agents approached the owner of the store where Hunter bought the gun and asked to take the paperwork involving the sale, according to two people, one of whom has firsthand knowledge of the episode and the other was briefed by a Secret Service agent after the fact.

“The FBI and Secret Service have both been implicated in a corrupt clean-up operation to protect Hunter Biden from the criminal consequences of his gun scandal,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.

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