- Respondents say FBI 'misled' the public by urging social media firms to censor
- Half would have voted differently had they known the laptop story was real
- 71 percent say the 2020 Biden-Trump election would have played out differently
- Survey comes as Elon Musk brands Twitter a 'crime scene' of censorship
- Republicans are set to probe Hunter Biden when they run the House in January
Americans who track the Hunter Biden laptop saga by wide margins say the FBI misled the public with claims about Russian disinformation, and that the 2020 election may have played out differently had the story not been suppressed.
The survey by TIPP Insights follows revelations by new Twitter CEO Elon Musk that the firm's executives in 2020 censored shocking details about Hunter Biden, son of then-presidential candidate Joe Biden, at the climax of that year's election.
Of the 1351 persons surveyed by the TIPP Poll in December, over a third, 37% (501 persons), are closely following the Hunter Biden laptop issue, but 59% are not following the matter. 4% were unsure. The share of those following has increased from 32% in August to 37% in December.
The survey of 501 adults who follow the issue found that nearly two thirds believe the details about Hunter Biden's chaotic lifestyle of drugs, prostitutes and overseas business dealings are authentic.
That includes 81 percent of Republican voters and 48 percent of Democrats.
More than two thirds of respondents also said that the FBI and the intelligence community deliberately misled the public by urging Facebook and Twitter to stop spreading such stories, which the agency deemed foreign 'disinformation'.
An even wider margin — more than three quarters of respondents — said any collusion between senior Democrats, the FBI, intelligence chiefs and the Biden campaign on suppressing the story would have denied voters access to critical information in the run-up to the election.
Another half of respondents said they would have voted differently had they known the Hunter Biden's laptop revelations were authentic. Interestingly, Republican and Democratic voters were more or less aligned on this question.
Finally, a wide margin of respondents — 71 percent — said a truthful interpretation of the Hunter Biden laptop issue could have swung the November 3 election, which saw Biden defeat incumbent Donald Trump by 51.3-46.9 percent of the popular vote.
The polling, provided exclusively to DailyMail.com, shows that Americans increasingly believe the Hunter Biden laptop revelations are authentic, and that the FBI and Democrats tried to suppress information that was pertinent to voting in the divisive presidential contest.
TIPP Insights is a right-leaning polling outfit that gets an A+ rating by FiveThirtyEight. Its survey results of 1,351 adults focussed on the third who closely follow the Hunter Biden laptop saga.
The smaller sample size yields a higher-than-usual error margin of ± 4.5 percentage points.
The seriousness of the issue is apparent as most people think that the FBI and Intelligence Community deliberately misled Congress when they briefed members that the laptop was "disinformation." 66% think Congress was misled. 21% do not think so, and another 13% are unsure.
The polling, carried out between December 7-9, came as Musk branded Twitter a 'crime scene' and vowed to dig up all the firm's 'darkest secrets' over its suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story.
The tycoon is working with several journalists to publish files and messages from the social media company — now known as the 'Twitter files' — about its decision-making processes when it comes to censorship.
The latest Twitter files released over the weekend revealed FBI agents pressured the social media company to censor conservative pundits who pushed unfounded claims that the 2020 election was stolen.
That work has garnered the attention of House Republicans, who have invited Musk to testify in their investigations over Hunter Biden, who faces allegations of illegal business dealing in China and Ukraine that could implicate his father, the president.
US Rep James Comer, of Kentucky, who is poised to lead the House Oversight Committee when Republicans take over the chamber, told the New York Post he has reached out to Musk personally.
Comer says there are 'troubling questions' about the business dealings of Joe Biden's son Hunter and one of the president's brothers, James Biden, that require deeper investigation.
Republican lawmakers and their staff have been analyzing messages and financial transactions found on a laptop that belonged to Hunter Biden for the past year.
They have discussed issuing congressional subpoenas to foreign entities that did business with him, and have hired James Mandolfo, a former federal prosecutor, to help the committee probe the claims.
Hunter Biden's taxes and foreign business work are already under federal investigation, with a grand jury in Delaware hearing testimony in recent months.
While he never held a position on the presidential campaign or in the White House, his membership on the board of a Ukrainian energy company and his efforts to strike deals in China have long raised questions about whether he traded on his father's public service.
President Biden says he's never spoken to his son about his foreign business.
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