The former FBI informant who claimed President Joe Biden and his son Hunter took a $10 million bribe from Ukrainian energy company Burisma was sentenced to six years in prison on Wednesday.
Smirnov agreed to a plea deal in December after failing to have the charges dismissed. He pled guilty to one count of creating a false federal record and three counts of tax evasion. The defendant was also accused of refusing to report over $2 million in income taxes over 20 years.
The defendant's allegations about Joe and Hunter Biden became the subject of a House investigation into the family. It was a hotly debated issue as the FBI refused to provide the document that detailed Smirnov's story about his communications with Burisma officials who were allegedly interested in bribing the president and his son.
The former informant was accused of concocting the bribery scandal to influence the outcome of the 2020 presidential election.
Smirnov, a dual U.S. and Israeli citizen, falsely claimed to his FBI handler that executives from the Ukrainian energy company Burisma had paid then-Vice President Biden and his son $5 million each around 2015.
Smirnov’s explosive claim in 2020 came after he expressed “bias” about Joe Biden as a presidential candidate, according to prosecutors. In reality, investigators found Smirnov had only routine business dealings with Burisma starting in 2017 — after Biden’s term as vice president.
Prosecutors noted that Smirnov’s false claim “set off a firestorm in Congress” when it resurfaced years later as part of the House impeachment inquiry into President Biden, a Democrat who defeated Republican then-President Donald Trump in 2020. The Biden administration dismissed the House impeachment effort as a “stunt.”
The former informant will receive credit for time already served since he was arrested in February 2024. Prosecutors agreed to seek no more than a six-year sentence, while the defense agreed not to ask for less than four years. The defendant will pay about $675,000 to the IRS, according to CNN.
In court filings, prosecutors argued in favor of a six-year prison sentence, calling Smirnov a “liar and a tax cheat” who “betrayed the United States.” Prosecutors said his baseless corruption allegations against the Bidens were “among the most serious kinds of election interference one can imagine,” because they roiled both the 2020 and 2024 election cycles.
Smirnov’s allegations played an important role in an investigation launched by House Republicans into the Biden family. The authorities found that he falsified his communications with business contacts at Burisma, turning them into allegations that the Bidens accepted bribes in exchange for using their positions to benefit the company.
Smirnov also spent large sums of money on luxury items such as a Las Vegas condo, a lease for a Bentley, and other purchases.
However, some doubted the veracity of the allegations against Smirnov. Sens. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Ron Johnson (R-WI) questioned: “how the Justice Department and FBI could use this Confidential Human Source for approximately 14 years, pay him hundreds of thousands of dollars, use this information in investigations and prosecutions, and then ultimately determine he’s a liar.”
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