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Watchdog Files Lawsuit Against DHS For Not Releasing Alleged Secret Service Records On Hunter Biden Gun Incident

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  • A watchdog group filed a lawsuit Monday against the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for not releasing alleged Secret Service records related to the Hunter Biden gun incident.
  • Judicial Watch in March 2021 sent a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to Secret Service, a component of DHS, to obtain communications and records having to do with the disposal of Hunter Biden’s firearm in a Delaware dumpster in October 2018.
  • “The Secret Service and the Biden administration apparently are in cover-up mode for Hunter Biden,” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said in a statement. 

A watchdog group is suing the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) over its failure to release alleged Secret Service records related to a gun incident involving President Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden.

Judicial Watch in March 2021 sent a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to Secret Service, a component of DHS, to obtain communications and records having to do with the disposal of Hunter Biden’s gun in a Delaware dumpster in October 2018. Now, the watchdog is suing DHS for not providing any records, according to a complaint filed Monday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. (RELATED: Senate Republicans Demand Special Protections For US Attorney Investigating Hunter Biden)

The Secret Service has denied involvement with the missing gun incident. But messages from Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop, which were reported on by the New York Post in March 2021, show Hunter texted someone about the incident and said “the police the FBI the secret service came on the scene.”

Judicial Watch’s lawsuit pertains to an Oct. 23, 2018, incident in which Joe Biden’s daughter-in-law Hallie Biden took Hunter’s gun and tossed it in a dumpster behind a grocery store, Politico first reported in March 2021, citing a Delaware police report. Hallie Biden reported the gun missing to police and Secret Service agents met with the owner of the store where Hunter purchased the firearm as well as attempted to get the owner to provide documents in connection to the firearm’s sale, the outlet reported.

“The Secret Service and the Biden administration apparently are in cover-up mode for Hunter Biden,” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said in a statement. “Whether its Hunter Biden’s laptop, his business practices and travel, or these documents related to the careless disposal of a gun in a dumpster near a high school, this administration continues to put up unlawful roadblocks to any effort to investigate the activities of the Biden family, particularly Hunter.”

The store owner later gave the documents to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), an agency that oversees gun laws, the outlet reported. Still, Hunter Biden claimed in April 2021 he does not believe Secret Service was involved in probing the gun incident.

Hunter Biden is currently under investigation for the gun incident as well as alleged foreign-lobbying violations by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Delaware. Over 30 Senate Republicans demanded U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland grant special counsel protections amid its probe to David C. Weiss, U.S. Attorney for the District of Delaware.

US President Joe Biden's son Hunter Biden exits Holy Spirit Catholic Church after attending mass with his father (out of frame) in Johns Island, South Carolina on August 13, 2022. (Photo by Nicholas Kamm / AFP) (Photo by NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP via Getty Images)

Photo by Nicholas Kamm / AFP

The president’s son accused Hallie Biden of attempting to turn his life into “an unbearable proposition” in October 2018 after she reported the gun missing, the Washington Examiner reported in June 2022, citing messages from a copy of Hunter’s abandoned laptop.

“Beau owned a handgun issued by the state and I[t] was in the front glove compartment of his car. So f*** you … What right do you f***ing have Hallie,” Hunter reportedly wrote in an Oct. 23, 2018 text exchange hours after Hallie put the gun in the dumpster, the Examiner reported. “There are 5 guns in dads house. There are f***ing more weapons in your sons room then in an armory.”

Judicial Watch is seeking to obtain “reports, telephone logs, witness statements, and memoranda” in connection to the gun incident. It is also seeking to obtain communications between Secret Service officials internally and with outside parties over the gun incident.

A lawyer for Hunter Biden did not respond to a request for comment nor did DHS or Secret Service.

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