Mediaite has learned that Fox News was first approached by Rudy Giuliani to report on a tranche of files alleged to have come from Hunter Biden’s unclaimed laptop left at a Delaware computer repair shop, but that the news division chose not to run the story unless or until the sourcing and veracity of the emails could be properly vetted.

With the general election just three weeks away, Giuliani ultimately brought the story to the New York Post, which shares the same owner, Rupert Murdoch. The tabloid has been exhaustively covering the contents of the laptop — which include everything from emails regarding Hunter Biden’s work for a Ukrainian company to personal photos of the recovering addict — with each morsel being amplified in the conservative media world, including on Fox News’ top-rated opinion programs. Thus far, the Fox’s News division has only been able to verify one email from the tranche leaked.

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But according to two sources familiar with the matter, the lack of authentication of Hunter Biden’s alleged laptop, combined with established concerns about Giuliani as a reliable source and his desire for unvetted publication, led the network’s news division to pass. Fox News declined to comment on this story.

• The report was mostly written by a staff writer who refused to put their name on it, per two Post sources.
• Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani says he gave the material to the Post because he was worried other outlets would practice actual journalism: “Either nobody else would take it, or if they took it, they would spend all the time they could to try to contradict it before they put it out."
• Top figures at the paper were involved in deciding how to proceed, including Editor-in-Chief Stephen Lynch, Digital Editor-in-Chief Michelle Gotthelf, and adviser Colin Allan.
• Editors at the Post pressed people there to add their name to the byline, according to two sources who spoke to The New York Times' Katie Robertson.
• Of the two bylines on the piece, we had known that Emma-Jo Morris had worked at Sean Hannity's Fox News show recently, and that her Instagram had pictures of her with figures including Hannity, Roger Stone, and Steve Bannon. Robertson adds that Gabrielle Fonrouge, who had the other byline on the piece, did not know that she had a byline until after the piece went live. Robertson writes that three sources told her that Fonrouge “had little to do with the reporting or writing of the article.”