Former CBS investigative reporter Catherine Herridge says declassified records point to Chinese schemes that may have included blackmail aimed at the Bidens, and those files were part of President Biden’s daily intelligence brief.
Catherine Herridge, formerly of CBS News and later tied to Fox, spent hours combing through records declassified under the Trump administration and flagged material she believes the public and many journalists overlooked. Her work focused on documents that touch on Chinese interference in U.S. elections and what those actions mean for national security. The files she examined are said to relate to what would have appeared in a president’s daily briefing, which raises tough questions about what officials knew and when.
President Trump used a primetime address on July 16 to lay out a sweeping case about foreign meddling, claiming Beijing compromised the voter data of roughly 220 million Americans and engaged in influence operations inside U.S. media. He also alleged that some intelligence officers downplayed the scope of what happened. Those are big assertions that, if backed by documents, change the political and legal landscape.
On July 25 Herridge appeared on NewsNation’s Katie Pavlich Tonight and said she found records that reference blackmail by Chinese actors and suggested the targeting involved President Biden’s family. The material she highlighted was included among the declassified batch, and she believes it deserved closer attention than the legacy press gave it.
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“What we saw in the release of the records, which I’m afraid I think in the media or legacy media there was kind of a willful blindness. They didn’t want to look at the records. All you had to do was spend a couple of hours. I found these records which are talking about blackmail by China. It was for President Biden’s daily brief. I can conclude, I think, that it was probably about targeting his family”
The quote lands hard because it accuses parts of the press of purposeful avoidance rather than mere oversight, and Herridge presses the point that the records were available to anyone who would read them. If true, the claim of blackmail aimed at the president’s family amounts to a national security crisis with political consequences. It also raises questions about why agencies or officials might have failed to escalate the findings publicly or to elected leaders.
This is not the first time allegations tying foreign influence to the Biden orbit surfaced in public discussion. Tony Bobulinski, a former associate of Hunter Biden, hinted at similar concerns during the 2020 election and handed over documents to investigators. Public reporting now notes the FBI had access to materials linked to that probe for years, which feeds into the larger narrative that crucial evidence may have sat in government hands without being fully aired.
Here’s the full segment. The broadcast shows Herridge outlining which documents she found and why she believes they point to blackmail and targeted pressure rather than simple financial ties or routine intelligence chatter. Folks skeptical of the current White House will argue these findings demand swift congressional oversight and a clear accounting from intelligence agencies.
Beyond the blackmail allegation, the declassified files reportedly describe broader Chinese efforts to shape American discourse, including paying some U.S. reporters and allegedly accessing voter databases. That combination of tactics — financial influence, media manipulation, and data compromise — reads like a coordinated campaign rather than isolated incidents. Seen together, it explains why Republicans and national security hawks are pressing for deeper, public scrutiny.
There are legal, political, and security threads here that cannot be ignored. If foreign actors compromised so much data and used leverage against American families tied to the presidency, the remedies should include criminal probes, hearings, and reforms to how intelligence is shared with the executive branch. Citizens deserve to know whether the highest offices were knowingly compromised and whether a proper chain of command responded.
The stakes are not academic: the integrity of elections, the safety of sensitive information, and the public’s trust in institutions all hang in the balance. Herridge’s review of the declassified records puts new pressure on investigators and lawmakers to act rather than shrug off another set of troubling disclosures. Whatever comes next, the public should insist on transparency and accountability from both the intelligence community and political leaders.
