Hunter Biden filed suit this week against a former Trump White House aide over his alleged role in the laptop data scandal, which his eldest son’s lawyer blasted as a “sustained, disaffected and bigoted campaign” to advance an “extremist” agenda.
A 14-page complaint filed in California federal court on Wednesday accuses Garrett Ziegler, a onetime aide to President Donald Trump’s trade adviser Peter Navarro, of violating state computer and data fraud laws by accessing “tens of thousands of emails, thousands of photos, and dozens of videos and recordings” belonging to Hunter, according to the suit seen by The Post.
Ziegler and 10 other unnamed defendants “spent countless hours accessing, interfering with, manipulating, altering, copying and destroying computer data that did not belong to them,” the filing alleges.
Some of the data — which included Hunter Biden’s financial and bank records and even credit card details — was stored on the eldest son’s troubled iPhone and backed up via iCloud, meaning it was accessed by “circumventing technical or code-based barriers specifically designed and intended to prevent such access, ” according to the complaint, which was first reported by ABC News.
Garrett Ziegler is being sued by Hunter Biden over his alleged role in the laptop data scandal. Facebook / The Kari Lake
Ziegler then distributed the content of the data, including boasting it on his non-profit website, Marco Polo.
“While Defendant Ziegler is entitled to extremist and counterfactual opinions, he does not have the right to engage in illegal activities to advance his right-wing agenda,” wrote lawyers for Ziegler, who is now one of the more vocal critics of the Biden camp.
“In the last two weeks, Defendant Ziegler has declared on social media that Plaintiff’s efforts to grant him due process in the future will meet with violence: ‘If the son of the US president sends a proxy [i.e., a process server] to trespass on my property, I will blow their minds,’” the suit reads, citing some of Ziegler’s more inflammatory comments in the weeks leading up to the filing.
The contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop were initially reported by the New York Post.
The lawsuit seeks a jury trial under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act and California’s Comprehensive Computer Data Fraud and Access Act, which allow plaintiffs to sue those they believe harmed them by accessing their data without permission, according to court filings.
Computer fraud cases can carry prison terms and hefty fines in California.
Ziegler worked in the White House from February 2019 to January 2021, according to CNN.
Hunter also sued John Paul Mac Isaac, a computer repairman in Delaware.Robert Miller
In an emailed statement to Politico, Ziegler said the lawsuit was “not worth the paper it’s written on.”
“Neither I nor the nonprofit, Marco Polo, have been hit with any lawsuits — but the one I read this morning from the Central District of California should embarrass Winston & Strawn LLP,” he scoffed.
“In addition to the many state and federal laws and regulations that protect authors like me and the publications that Marco Polo does, it is no loss to us that Joe’s son filed this SLAPP the day after the Impeachment investigation into his father was announced.” The acronym he used refers to the “strategic prosecution of public participation” – seen as an effort to stifle critics.
The Mac Shop, where the alleged laptop scandal began in October 2020. AFP via Getty Images
The California lawsuit is part of Hunter Biden’s legal campaign against those who reportedly played a role in the notorious laptop scandal ahead of the 2020 election.
In March, the younger Biden’s lawyer filed another lawsuit against John Paul Mac Isaac, a Delaware computer repairman who allegedly obtained and disseminated data from Hunter’s laptop in April 2019, the outlet said.
The case is still ongoing.
Hunter Biden’s data also includes dozens of photos with scantily clad sex workers.
Biden’s lawyers have also been circling Ziegler for months: Earlier this year, Hunter representative Abbe Lowell sent two letters asking the former aide to keep documents related to the laptop issue, indicating plans to begin formal litigation, according to ABC.
The high-profile laptop lawsuit comes amid the trial of Hunter Biden, 53, who a few months ago saw the collapse of a plea deal on misdemeanor tax and gun charges that would have eased federal investigations into his international business activities.
On Tuesday, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) announced plans to order House Republicans to launch a formal impeachment inquiry into President Biden over the family’s foreign business deals.
Hunter Biden and President Biden have faced years of scrutiny over their foreign business dealings.AFP via Getty Images
“Through our investigation, we found that President Biden lied to the American people about his own knowledge of his family’s foreign business dealings,” McCarthy claimed.
The next day, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre was seen leaving the briefing room when a Post reporter asked about the president’s connection to his son’s foreign partner.
Earlier in the briefing, Jean-Pierre referred to the impeachment proceedings as “baseless” and insisted that Biden, 80, “did nothing wrong.”
An attorney for Hunter Biden did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for comment.
With Postal wire
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Source: thtrangdai.edu.vn/en/
