The source behind the infamous Hunter Biden laptop story that nearly sparked a political and media firestorm during the 2020 presidential election has come forward and announced he has plans to sue.

On Wednesday, John Paul Mac Isaac, who owned the Delaware laptop repair store that came into possession of the younger Biden's laptop, told the New York Post that he is suing a number of media companies as well as Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., for damages to his reputation that were endured in the wake of the story. Of the media companies Mac Isaac aims to bring to court in his multimillion-dollar defamation suit are the Daily Beast, Politico, and CNN.

“After fighting to reveal the truth, all I want now is for the rest of the country to know that there was a collective and orchestrated effort by social and mainstream media to block a real story with real consequences for the nation,” Mac Isaac said in his interview.

The saga began in April 2019 when Mac Isaac said Hunter came to his store and left his laptop for repairs only to never return. The repairman then said he examined its contents and claimed to have come across material that allegedly raised questions about Hunter and his uncle Jim Biden's business ventures and the level of knowledge now-President Biden had of their activities.

By Mac Isaac’s telling, he shared a copy of the hard drive first with the FBI in December 2019 and then with then-President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, in August 2020. Giuliani then passed the hard drive copy along to the New York Post, which first ran the story in October 2020.

Twitter quickly blocked the story on its platform for violating what it said was its policy against published hacked documents. The Daily Beast reported that Hunter's laptop was "purloined" by Mac Isaac in an article about the FBI's investigation into whether the device was part of a foreign intelligence operation. For its part, Politico published a story on how a number of former intelligence officials were of the opinion that the laptop was a possible plant by foreign adversaries.

Meanwhile, CNN’s Wolf Blitzer spoke to Rep. Schiff in the wake of the New York Post story, who alleged that Russia was responsible for the laptop story. The FBI opened a probe into the possibility, but it has not confirmed whether Russia or Russian actors were in any way connected.

Mac Isaac said that the insinuations that he was part of a Russian disinformation operation against President Biden has cost him friends as well as his business, which is no longer in operation. He added that he has been the victim of harassment at his home over his involvement with the story.

A Trump-aligned nonprofit called The America Project has been supporting Mac Isaac in his lawsuits. Counted among the group's members are Trump loyalists Michael Flynn, his former National Security Advisor, and former Overstock CEO Pat Byrne.

RELATED STORIES
Joe biden Donald trump Congress