Alexander Smirnov (1981-) was a Russian criminal, fixer, and agent who served as an FBI informant for more than a decade in the early 21st century and played a central role in the United States Republican Party's attempts to impeach President Joe Biden over a fabricated scandal invented by Smirnov at the behest of the Russian government.
Smirnov had relationships with corrupt foreign businesses and government officials and oligarchs and public officials in the former USSR before becoming an FBI source in 2010 and providing legitimate and prized information in criminal investigations over the years. At the same time, he worked as a source to Israeli and other US intelligence services. In 2020, due to his antipathy towards Joe Biden, he told the FBI a brazen lie that the owner of the Ukrainian energy company Burisma had arranged to pay $5 million in bribes to both President Biden and his son Hunter Biden. That claim was leaked to Republicans, utilizing his allegations for their attempted impeachment of President Biden. As early as 2020, the FBI doubted Smirnov's claims about the Bidens, as he had fabricated a story involving Biden staying at a hotel in Ukraine, when Hunter Biden had never been to the country. In 2023, he reported more than a dozen meetings or discussions with Russian officials, after which he promoted false new narratives and changed his past stories. He was arrested at his home in Las Vegas on 22 February 2023 as he planned a months-long, multi-country foreign trip, having been indicted on charges that he lied to investigators about the Bidens.