乔·拜登总统儿子的代理律师亨特·拜登据美国广播公司获得的一封信称，他们威胁要起诉福克斯新闻频道违反“报复性色情”法律，并公布自那以来不可信的贿赂指控，作为“以虚假的眼光描绘他”计划的一部分。
亨特·拜登的律师上周将这封信转交给了福克斯新闻频道的律师，信中要求这家保守派新闻媒体“保存与这封信中的指控可能相关的所有文件”——这是诉讼的常见前兆。
“我们预计对福克斯的诉讼...信中写道:“迫在眉睫。
为了给福克斯写这封信，亨特·拜登聘请了杰拉戈斯律师事务所该公司的负责人马克·杰拉戈斯曾代理过迈克尔·杰克逊、歌手克瑞丝·布朗和女演员维诺娜·赖德等一线明星。
杰拉戈斯也有代表总统家庭成员的经验:他在2001年为前总统比尔·克林顿的弟弟小罗杰·克林顿谈判了一项认罪协议，罪名是酒后驾车。
在多年默默忍受联邦刑事调查和铺天盖地的负面新闻后，亨特·拜登开始了一场咄咄逼人的法律反攻去年，他起诉了几个人，这些人在获取和传播一台据称属于他的笔记本电脑的内容方面发挥了一定作用。
其中包括最初获得这台笔记本电脑的电脑修理工约翰·保罗·麦克·艾萨克;鲁迪·朱利安尼否认了亨特·拜登关于他操纵和传播笔记本电脑数据的指控;前特朗普白宫助手加勒特·齐格勒将笔记本电脑的内容(包括几幅图片)发布到互联网上。
根据Mac Isaac及其律师的陈述，2019年4月12日，亨特·拜登带着三台损坏的设备来到Mac Isaac的电脑维修店，询问数据是否可以恢复。麦克·艾萨克说，几天后，他让亨特·拜登回到商店取回设备，并支付85美元的服务费。麦克·艾萨克说他从未收到亨特·拜登的回复，发票也从未支付。
据麦克·艾萨克和他的律师说，90天后，根据据称亨特·拜登第一次去麦克·艾萨克的商店时签署的工作订单协议，被遗弃的笔记本电脑成为麦克·艾萨克的财产。
Mac Isaac随后在2019年12月将笔记本电脑和外置硬盘交给了美国联邦调查局，后来试图与时任总统唐纳德·特朗普的个人律师鲁迪·朱利安尼分享设备上的信息，后者在2020年总统大选前几周将设备上的内容提供给了特朗普的其他盟友和一些新闻媒体。
在给ABC新闻的一份声明中，亨特·拜登的法律团队说，“在过去的五年里，福克斯新闻频道无情地攻击亨特·拜登，为了提高收视率和经济利益，把他画成漫画。最近对美国联邦调查局线人斯米尔诺夫的起诉揭露了福克斯煽动的虚假信息阴谋，这些阴谋由他们的付费代理人实现，并由福克斯企业货币化。我们计划追究他们的责任。”
亨特·拜登的律师要求福克斯新闻频道“迅速删除并禁止访问”这些图片。他们在4月23日发出了这封信，并要求福克斯的法律团队在4月26日星期五之前“采取这封信中概述的措施”。
一位知情人士说，截至周一，福克斯新闻频道没有回应。福克斯新闻频道的发言人没有回应ABC新闻的置评请求。
如果亨特·拜登继续起诉福克斯新闻频道，这将是他第一次起诉大型媒体公司。
在给福克斯新闻频道的信中，亨特·拜登的律师引用了统计数据，他们说这些数据表明，近年来，媒体对总统儿子的报道变得无处不在。
福克斯新闻频道的一些明星主播，包括玛利亚·巴蒂罗姆和肖恩·哈尼蒂，播出了数百段关于a现已不可信的说法根据媒体监督机构Media Matters收集的统计数据，乔和亨特·拜登接受了一名乌克兰寡头数百万美元的贿赂。
指控的来源亚历山大·斯米尔诺夫(Alexander Smirnov)自那以来一直否认对他编造故事在政治上伤害总统的指控。
但根据他们的信，亨特·拜登的律师指控“福克斯公司没有回溯故事和纠正记录，而是加倍努力揭穿贿赂指控，并利用斯米尔诺夫的起诉书暗示一个更深层次的阴谋。”
亨特·拜登的律师还要求福克斯新闻频道从其流媒体服务中删除一部名为《亨特·拜登审判》的迷你剧。
这部迷你剧被福克斯国家电视台(Fox Nation)描述为一场模拟审判，旨在展示“亨特·拜登可能的审判会是什么样子”，其中包括几幅亨特·拜登的色情图片，这些图片在信中被复制。
亨特·拜登的律师写道，这部迷你剧“非法发布并继续发布拜登先生的裸体亲密图像以及参与性行为，违反了大多数州的法律，这些法律禁止未经同意披露露骨的性图像和视频，有时被称为‘报复色情’法律”。
信中引用的图片可以追溯到亨特·拜登在毒瘾和酒瘾的痛苦中挣扎的时候。在他2021年的回忆录《美丽的事物》中，亨特·拜登描述了频繁的药物注射狂欢，其中经常涉及与女性的性互动。
当特别顾问魏红星带来与税收有关的费用去年对拜登的指控包括亨特·拜登如何在女性身上花费数十万美元而不是纳税。亨特·拜登对这些指控拒不认罪。
Hunter Biden threatens to sue Fox News for airing 'revenge porn'
Attorneys representing President Joe Biden's sonHunter Bidenare threatening to sue Fox News for violating "revenge porn" laws and publishing since-discredited bribery allegations as part of a scheme to "paint him in a false light," according to a letter obtained by ABC News.
The letter, which Hunter Biden's counsel transmitted to attorneys at Fox News last week, includes a request for the conservative news outlet to "preserve all documents potentially relevant to the allegations in this letter" -- a common precursor to litigation.
"We anticipate that litigation against FOX ... is imminent," the letter says.
To pen the letter to Fox, Hunter Biden enlisted the law firm Geragos& Geragos, whose principal, Mark Geragos, has represented A-listers like Michael Jackson, singer Chris Brown, and actress Winona Ryder.
Geragos also has experience representing family members of presidents: He negotiated a plea deal in 2001 for Roger Clinton Jr., the brother of former President Bill Clinton, for driving under the influence.
After years of quietly weathering a federal criminal investigation and deluge of negative press, Hunter Biden embarked on anaggressive legal counteroffensivelast year against several individuals who played some role in obtaining and disseminating the contents of a laptop purportedly belonging to him.
Among those are John Paul Mac Isaac, the computer repairman who initially obtained the laptop; Rudy Giuliani, who denied Hunter Biden's claim that he manipulated and disseminated data from the laptop; and Garrett Ziegler, a onetime Trump White House aide who published the contents of the laptop -- including several graphic images -- to the internet.
According to accounts given by Mac Isaac and his attorney, on April 12, 2019, Hunter Biden arrived at Mac Isaac's computer repair shop with three damaged devices and asked if the data could be recovered. Days later, Mac Isaac said, he asked Hunter Biden to return to the shop to retrieve the devices and pay an $85 service fee. Mac Isaac has said he never heard back from Hunter Biden, and the invoice was never paid.
After 90 days, according to Mac Isaac and his attorney, the abandoned laptop became Mac Isaac's property, pursuant to the work order agreement Hunter Biden allegedly signed when he first visited Mac Isaac's shop.
Mac Isaac subsequently turned the laptop and external hard drive over to the FBI in December 2019, and later sought to share information from the devices with then-President Donald Trump's personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, who made the contents of the devices available to other Trump allies and some news outlets in the weeks prior to the 2020 presidential election.
In a statement to ABC News, Hunter Biden's legal team said, "For the last five years, Fox News has relentlessly attacked Hunter Biden and made him a caricature in order to boost ratings and for its financial gain. The recent indictment of FBI informant Smirnov has exposed the conspiracy of disinformation that has been fueled by Fox, enabled by their paid agents and monetized by the Fox enterprise. We plan on holding them accountable."
Attorneys for Hunter Biden demanded that Fox News "expeditiously remove and disable access" to the images. They sent the letter on April 23 and requested that Fox's legal team "have taken steps outlined in this letter" by Friday, April 26.
A person familiar with the matter said that as of Monday, Fox News had not responded. A spokesperson for Fox News did not respond to a request for comment from ABC News.
If Hunter Biden moves forward with a lawsuit against Fox News, it would constitute his first action against a major media firm.
In their letter to Fox News, attorneys for Hunter Biden cited statistics that they say demonstrate how ubiquitous the outlet's coverage of the president's son had become in recent years.
Some of Fox News' star anchors, including Maria Bartiromo and Sean Hannity, ran hundreds of segments about anow-discredited claimthat Joe and Hunter Biden accepted millions of dollars in bribes from a Ukrainian oligarch, according to statistics gathered by media watchdog Media Matters.
Alexander Smirnov, the source of the allegation, has since pleaded not guilty to charges that he fabricated the story to harm the president politically.
But according their letter, attorneys for Hunter Biden charge that "rather than walk back the story and correct the record, FOX double-downed on the debunked bribery allegation and used Smirnov's indictment to suggest an even deeper conspiracy."
MORE: FBI source charged for allegedly providing false info on Bidens, which was cited by Republicans
Attorneys for Hunter Biden also demanded that Fox News remove a miniseries called "The Trial of Hunter Biden" from its streaming services.
The miniseries, described by Fox Nation as a mock trial that seeks to show "how a possible Hunter Biden trial might look," includes several sexually graphic images of Hunter Biden, which are reproduced in the letter.
The miniseries "unlawfully published and continues to publish intimate images of Mr. Biden depicting him in the nude as well as engaged in sex acts in violation of the majority of states' laws against the nonconsensual disclosure of sexually explicit images and videos, sometimes referred to as 'revenge porn' laws," Hunter Biden's attorneys wrote.
The images cited in the letter date back to a time when Hunter Biden was in the throes of drug and alcohol addiction. In his 2021 memoir, "Beautiful Things," Hunter Biden described frequent drug-infused binges that often involved sexual interactions with women.
When special counsel David Weiss broughttax-related chargesagainst Biden last year, his indictment included an accounting of how Hunter Biden spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on women instead of paying his taxes. Hunter Biden has pleaded not guilty to those charges.
