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Hunter Biden is suing the owner of the Delaware computer repair shop for invasion of privacy over the now infamous laptop computer that revealed embarrassing information about the president’s son ahead of the 2020 election.
In the lawsuit filed on Friday in the U.S. District Court in Delaware, Hunter Biden’s legal team accused the shop owner, John Paul Mac Isaac, of a politically motivated invasion of their client’s privacy by turning over the abandoned laptop to a third party, eventually putting it in the hands of news reporters.
“Mac Isaac intended and knew, or clearly should have known, that people to whom he provided the data that he believed to belong to Mr. Biden would use it against then-candidate Joseph Biden and to assist then-President Trump,” the lawyers wrote in the case.
The legal action was a countersuit in response to an earlier case filed by Mr. Mac Isaac claiming that he had been defamed by Hunter Biden’s claims that he had illegally accessed the data on the laptop computer.
Mr. Mac Isaac’s lawyer, Ronald Poliquin, said on Friday that his legal team was still reviewing the countersuit and would respond in court.
In addition to Hunter Biden, Mr. Mac Isaac’s defamation case also names as defendants CNN, Politico, Rep. Adam Schiff, California Democrat and President Biden’s campaign.
Mr. Mac Isaac alleges Hunter Biden abandoned his computer for more than 90 days, at which point the repairman argues it legally became his property.
In their 42-page filing on Friday, Hunter Biden’s lawyers say that Mr. Mac Isaac claimed in his book that he accessed the data before the 90-day window was up, and raised questions about whether Mr. Bided signed an authorization agreement that Mr. Mac Isaac says gave him legal possession of the laptop.
They also argue that, for Mr. Mac Isaac to gain legal possession of the computer, he would have to file a petition in court after having it in his possession for a year, according to Delaware law.
The extensive filing also recounts in detail the alleged steps that Mr. Mac Isaac took to disseminate copies of the laptop’s data to members of his family and political operatives who eventually leaked the contents to the New York Post.
According to the filing, Mr. Mac Isaac sent a hard drive containing the laptop’s data to his father Richard Mac Isaac in New Mexico inside of a stuffed animal for safekeeping in September 2019.
He also sent a copy of the contents to his uncle, Ronald J. Scott Jr., who allegedly sent the data to journalists and Republican members of Congress.
In August 2020, Mr. Mac Isaac contacted Robert Costello, an attorney for President Trump’s attorney Rudolph W. Giuliani, regarding the data.
“Mr. Biden gave none of the individuals identified in this counterclaim permission to access, copy, disseminate, post or otherwise distribute any of his data, however they came into possession of it,” the filing states.
On Oct. 14, 2020, just weeks before the presidential election, The New York Post published a report exposing the laptop after receiving a copy of the data given to Mr. Costello.
The Post’s report set off an avalanche of embarrassing emails, photos, and text messages pulled from the laptop. It revealed details about Hunter Biden’s struggles with addiction and his hugely profitable foreign business dealings that critics say smack of influence peddling.
The emails also refuted President Biden’s claims that he never spoke with his son about overseas business deals.
The laptop has also provided a trove of evidence for Republicans in Congress who have pledged to probe whether the elder Mr. Biden had any involvement in his son’s overseas’ business deals and possibly influence-peddling.
The Biden campaign dismissed the contents as Russian disinformation, a theory that was also peddled in an open letter by 51 former intelligence officials.
The White House has continued to dismiss the authenticity of the laptop, which has been widely authenticated by several news outlets.
Last month, Hunter Biden’s legal team called on the Department of Justice and Delaware’s attorney general to launch investigations into the leak of the laptop’s contents.
Still, Abbe Lowell, a lead attorney on Hunter Biden’s team, denied that the letters confirmed the authenticity of the material discovered on the hard drive.
“These letters do not confirm Mac Isaac’s or others’ versions of a so-called laptop,” Abbe Lowell told Fox News Digital last month. “They address their conduct of seeking, manipulating and disseminating what they allege to be Mr. Biden‘s personal data, wherever they claim to have gotten it.”
