Informant who claimed Biden was guilty of bribery arrested by FBI for 'false statements'

An informant who made derogatory claims about President Joe Biden and his son Hunter has been arrested by the FBI after a grand jury charged him with false statements and obstruction, reported Politico's Kyle Cheney on Thursday.

Alexander Smirnov, who was identified as a confidential human source in the investigation, was arrested at Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas earlier this week, according to a statement released by the DOJ Thursday.

According to the indictment, Smirnov falsely claimed to FBI agents that executives at the Ukrainian industrial company Burisma told him they hired Hunter Biden to "protect us, through his dad, from all kinds of problems," at a time when Biden was vice president and bribed both of them for their efforts.

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At the time, Biden had been instrumental in pressuring Ukraine to remove prosecutor general Viktor Shokin, which Republicans have claimed was to prevent an investigation of Burisma. But this has been repeatedly debunked; Biden was acting in line with U.S. policy, Shokin was not planning to investigate Burisma, and international observers had accused him of corruption.

Per the DOJ statement, FBI officials became suspicious in part because Smirnov changed his story and provided different details when questioned at a later date.

This comes after a number of other failed Republican allegations against the Bidens, including a series of payments the younger Biden made to his father that turned out just to be repaying loans for a truck.