**Blinken's Immaculate Conception Defense: Why Things Are Likely To Get Worse For The Secretary Of State**
Blinken's Immaculate Conception Defense: Why Things Are Likely To Get Worse For The Secretary Of State
_Authored by Jonathan Turley,_ (https://jonathanturley.org/2023/05/03/blinkens-immaculate-conception-defense-why-things-are-likely-to-get-worse-for-the-secretary-of-state/)
Below is my column in the New York Post on the response of Secretary of State Antony Blinken to allegations that he was the original source for the Russian disinformation claim behind the Hunter Biden laptop. I wrote previously that **Blinken is struggling to avoid the look of a “made man” who earned his bones in the Biden Administration (https://jonathanturley.org/2023/04/24/antony-blinken-and-the-made-men-of-the-biden-administration/).**
Things are now **likely to get worse** after a **U.S. senator added an alleged false statements charge** to Blinken’s controversies.
Here is the column:
**Secretary of State Antony Blinken is claiming the political version of the immaculate conception.**
In a Fox interview, Blinken suggests that he is free of blame in the creation of the 2020 letter from former intelligence officials claiming that the Hunter Biden laptop story was likely Russian disinformation.
Despite the primary organizer of the letter naming him as the Biden campaign adviser who first raised the claim, Blinken insists that he remains without sin.
**All of the letter signatories are taking the same position.**
No one is at fault in one of the most calculated false stories ever planted in the midst of an election cycle.
That would be hard enough to believe, but it’s not even the only lie Blinken is accused of telling in relation to Hunter Biden.
**Blinken is also facing questions over allegedly false statements made to Congress related to Hunter Biden.**
He claims he never emailed Hunter, when messages on the president’s son’s laptop show he did.
Let’s start with the letter.
**With an enabling media, Joe Biden was able to use it to dismiss the evidence of possible influence peddling and criminal conduct on the laptop.**
During the presidential debate, an irate Biden cited the letter as proving that the laptop story was “garbage” and part of a “Russian plan.” (https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/white-house/white-house-wont-say-if-biden-stands-by-hunter-biden-russian-disinformation-claims) He added that “nobody believes” that the laptop was real.
Media and social media companies then buried the story, including some like Twitter banning its discussion before the election.
In the close election, the false story worked to negate a damaging scandal of corruption involving millions of dollars from foreign sources, including some involving figures associated with foreign intelligence.
After the Republican takeover of the House, former acting CIA Director Michael Morell was called before Congress to give a statement.
When pressed on how this letter came about, Morell reportedly did not hesitate: Blinken.
**He said Blinken was “the impetus” of the false claim.**
Morell then organized dozens of ex-national security officials to sign the letter claiming that the Hunter laptop story had “all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation.”
On Monday, Blinken told Fox News State Department correspondent Benjamin Hall that “with regard to that letter, I didn’t — it wasn’t my idea, didn’t ask for it, didn’t solicit it. And I think the testimony that the former deputy director of the CIA, Mike Morell, put forward confirms that.”
Morell called him the “impetus” for the letter. So perhaps Blinken is trying to dance on the semantic pinhead of being the “impetus” as opposed to the “solicitor” of the claim. Morell did not appear to have any doubts or hesitation after speaking with Blinken and quickly assembled an array of experts to make the false claim. Morell admitted to Congress that one of his goals was “to help then-Vice President Biden in the debate and to assist him in winning the election.”
**So it turns out no one is at fault. Not the “impetus,” not the organizer, not the signatories, not the media. Indeed, maybe it is the public for being chumps in buying this scam.**
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**Blinken is facing a more serious question raised by Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), who declared that Blinken told “boldface” lies when he testified under oath to Congress in 2020 on the controversy. Johnson said that Blinken said he never emailed Hunter Biden (https://nypost.com/2023/04/25/hunter-biden-told-burisma-colleague-of-blinken-meet-emails/).**
Yet emails between the president’s son and Blinken (https://nypost.com/2023/04/21/state-dep…