Ex-FBI informant accused of lying about Bidens agrees to plead guilty to federal charges

A former FBI informant accused of falsely claiming that President Biden and his son Hunter accepted bribes has agreed to plead guilty to federal charges, according to court papers filed Thursday.

As part of the plea deal with Justice Department special counsel David Weiss, California resident Alexander Smirnov will admit he fabricated the story that became central to the Republican impeachment inquiry in Congress.

The plea agreement comes just weeks after prosecutors filed new tax evasion charges against Smirnov. The two sides will recommend a sentence of at least two years behind bars and no more than six years, according to the agreement.

Attorneys for Smirnov didn’t immediately respond to an email seeking comment Thursday.

Smirnov was arrested in February on allegations that he falsely reported to the FBI in June 2020 that executives associated with the Ukrainian energy company Burisma paid Hunter Biden and Joe Biden $5 million each in 2015 or 2016. Smirnov told his handler that an executive claimed to have hired Hunter Biden to “protect us, through his dad, from all kinds of problems,” according to court documents.

Prosecutors said Smirnov had contact with Burisma executives, but it was routine and actually took place in 2017, after President Obama and Biden, his vice president, had left office — when Biden would have had no ability to influence U.S. policy. Prosecutors said he made the bribery allegations after he “expressed bias” against Biden while he was a presidential candidate.

He repeated some of the false claims when he was interviewed by FBI agents in September 2023 and changed his story about others and “promoted a new false narrative after he said he met with Russian officials,” prosecutors said.

Smirnov has agreed to plead guilty to charges of tax evasion and causing a false FBI record, according to court papers.

A valued FBI informant for the last 13 years, Smirnov, 43, lived much of this time in a quiet, seemingly unremarkable life in the suburbs of Los Angeles with a long-term girlfriend 15 years his senior, calling Calabasas, Woodland Hills and Orange County home.

Smirnov’s tenure as a confidential source for the FBI ended in spectacular fashion in February, with a grand jury in L.A. charging him with obstructing justice and lying to federal agents.

Smirnov is being prosecuted by the same special counsel who brought federal gun and tax charges against Hunter Biden. Hunter was supposed to be sentenced this month on his convictions in those cases until he was pardoned by his father.

Richer writes for the Associated Press. Los Angeles Times staff writer Matt Hamilton contributed to this report.