Hunter Biden sues former Trump aide over publication of laptop emails, images
Attorneys for Hunter Biden filed suit Wednesday against former Trump administration aide Garrett Ziegler over his alleged role in distributing embarrassing private emails and photos from a laptop Ziegler claimed belonged to the president’s son.
Ziegler and ten unnamed defendants accessed Biden’s cell phone data and distributed private emails and photos showing him in compromising positions, the suit alleges.
“Garrett Ziegler is a zealot who has waged a sustained, unhinged and obsessed campaign against [Hunter Biden] and the entire Biden family for more than two years,” the suit reads. “While Defendant Ziegler is entitled to his extremist and counterfactual opinions, he has no right to engage in illegal activities to advance his right-wing agenda.”
Biden’s attorneys demand a court order halting Ziegler and others from accessing the data and a jury trial to determine other damages.
Ziegler was a senior aide to Trump economic advisor Peter Navarro, who was last week convicted of contempt of Congress in an unrelated case.
The new suit claims that Ziegler has obsessively focused on Hunter Biden since leaving the administration in 2021.
“Ziegler has devoted most of his waking time and energy to accessing, tampering with, manipulating, altering, copying and otherwise using data contained on a copy of a hard drive that Defendants claim to be of Plaintiff’s 'laptop' computer and data that Defendants admit to have obtained by hacking into Plaintiff’s data, specifically an encrypted iPhone backup,” the suit reads.
The data from the laptop and cell phone have made countless news headlines, including photos and videos of Hunter Biden nude and using drugs. His emails have also been part of federal investigations and ongoing House probes.
The suit is a continuation of legal moves against those who have participated in the laptop controversy. In March, Hunter Biden’s attorneys sued the computer repair specialist who allegedly originally obtained the data from the laptop.
Hunter Biden is still facing his own legal threats after a plea deal with the Delaware federal prosecutor fell through. That deal would have seen him plead guilty to misdemeanor tax charges to settle a multi-year investigation into his finances and other activity.
Since the deal was nixed, Delaware U.S. attorney David Weiss has been named a special counsel and is reported to be planning new federal charges against Biden.
Hunter Biden is also under congressional investigation by the House Oversight Committee, which alleges that Hunter Biden used the influence of his father in corrupt business deals.
Related to that congressional investigation, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R) backed an impeachment inquiry into President Biden on Tuesday.