Snopes Changes Fact Check of Ashley Biden Diary from ‘Unproven’ to ‘True’ After Journal Authenticated in Letter to Judge

Snopes, a fact-checking website, quietly changed a fact check about a diary belonging to Ashley Biden, President Joe Biden’s daughter, being real.

The fact-checking website describes the diary, which was written by Ashley Biden, describing “actions taken toward her” by the president when she was younger that are “not appropriate,” according to Snopes.

This comes a month after Ashley Biden wrote a letter on April 8 to  Chief Judge Laura Taylor Swain of the Southern District of New York. The younger Biden acknowledged the existence of the diary, writing that she was “deeply saddened” to “even have to write” the letter because her diary had been “stolen and sold for profit.”

“The reason I have decided to not attend tomorrow’s sentencing in person is because it would only increase my pain,” Ashley Biden wrote. “Nonetheless, I write to ask Your Honor to sentence the defendant to time in prison.”

In regards to Snopes changing the rating of the fact check of Ashley Biden’s diary from “Unproven” to “True” the website wrote:

On April 29, 2024, Snopes changed the rating of this fact check from “Unproven” to “True” based on testimony provided by Ashley Biden. In an April 8 letter to a New York judge requesting jail time for one of the two people convicted of stealing her diary, Biden wrote, “I will forever have to deal with the fact that my personal journal can be viewed online.”

The National File, a conservative outlet, first reported on Ashley Biden’s diary in October 2020, stating that a Project Veritas whistleblower had provided the outlet with a digital copy of the diary.

In August 2022, two people, Aimee Harris and Robert Kurlander pleaded guilty to stealing and selling Ashley Biden’s private diary for $40,000.

The Department of Justice asked Judge Swain in early April, to sentence the woman who had stolen Ashley Biden’s diary to four to ten months in prison. This comes after prosecutors had initially requested Harris serve six months in prison, however, after she had moved her hearing date a dozen times, prosecutors sought to increase the sentence.

On April 9, Judge Swain sentenced Harris to serve one month in prison and three months on house arrest for having stolen and sold Ashley Biden’s diary.

Kurlander, who has also pleaded guilty, has not yet been sentenced.