Man who gave Hunter Biden laptop hard drive to NY Times, WaPo flees to Switzerland over fears for his safety

The man who distributed the Hunter Biden laptop hard drive to media organizations and Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) has reportedly fled to Switzerland over fears the Biden administration will retaliate against him.

What are the details?

Jack Maxey, the man who provided the hard drive to numerous media outlets including the New York Times and Washington Post, told the Daily Mail that he fled to Zurich two weeks ago over fears for his personal safety.

While there, Maxey said he is working with IT experts to continue a forensic examination of the hard drive.

"I came here so that we could do a forensic examination of Hunter's laptop safely in a country that still respects human liberty and the ideals of liberal democratic principles," Maxey said. "I do not believe this would have been possible inside the United States. We had numerous attempts on us from trying to do things like this there."

Maxey reportedly received a copy of the laptop hard drive from Rudy Giuliani, who received a copy from the owner of a Delaware computer shop where the laptop was allegedly abandoned by Hunter Biden in 2019.

Maxey claimed in his interview with the Daily Mail that black SUVs appeared outside his home last year after he contacted media outlets about the hard drive.

Maxey also told the Daily Mail that he has recovered "450 gigabytes of deleted material" on the hard drive, including more than 120,000 archived emails and tens of thousands of pictures and videos. The "erased material" is going to be published online, British newspaper the Times reported.

What is the background?

Hunter Biden, and controversy surrounding his purported laptop, was thrust back into the national spotlight after the New York Times and Washington Post reported they had authenticated the emails from the laptop as belonging to Hunter.

As the Justice Department's investigation into Hunter continues, new revelations involving Hunter are making headlines, including the allegation that Joe Biden wrote a college letter of recommendation for the son of one of Hunter's Chinese business associates in 2017. The White House is not commenting on the allegation.

Meanwhile, CBS News reported this week that "more than 150 financial transactions involving either Hunter or James Biden's global business affairs were flagged as concerning by U.S. banks for further review." James Biden is the president's brother.