By
/ CBS News
Washington — The Justice Department has charged two former FBI officials with lying to Congress over questions about Hunter Biden's laptop, according to the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, Jeanine Pirro.
She said in a post on X that the two former senior FBI officials, Nikki Floris, 46, and Bradley Benavides, 56, were charged Friday with lying to Congress about their roles on the Foreign Influence Task Force during the 2020 election, specifically the FBI's Hunter Biden investigations.
She wrote that one claimed to have learned about the investigation into former President Joe Biden's son from Wikipedia, even though evidence showed "their involvement in helping shape the public narrative about Hunter Biden's laptop right before the election."
Benavides and Floris were each charged in a criminal complaint with one count of lying to Congress.
Floris' lawyers said she was falsely accused of a crime and raised concerns about the timing of the charges.
"Nikki Floris is a patriot. She served our nation as a dedicated FBI intelligence officer for nearly 20 years. Yet today, the DOJ has accused her falsely of a crime on the say-so of politicians, not on the facts. It's no coincidence the government is filing these nonsense charges now, years later, on the eve of an election," they said in a statement. "The government's reasons for charging Nikki are as transparent as they are unjust: to push a false narrative for a shot at political points. It's another sad day for the DOJ, but we look forward to Nikki's day in court."
This is a developing story and will be updated.
Jacob Rosen contributed to this report.
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