WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A&nbsp;former&nbsp;FBI&nbsp;agent&nbsp;who&nbsp;helped lead the&nbsp;probe&nbsp;of&nbsp;Hunter&nbsp;Biden&nbsp;told congressional investigators that&nbsp;he&nbsp;was&nbsp;not&nbsp;aware&nbsp;of any political&nbsp;interference&nbsp;in the&nbsp;case, though&nbsp;he&nbsp;said higher-ups blocked an interview with President Joe&nbsp;Biden's son weeks after the&nbsp;2020 presidential election, transcripts show.
In transcripts from a July 17 interview with the&nbsp;Republican-controlled House of Representatives Oversight Committee, the&nbsp;unidentified&nbsp;FBI&nbsp;supervisory&nbsp;agent&nbsp;corroborated earlier testimony by an Internal Revenue Service whistleblower that investigators were&nbsp;not&nbsp;allowed to interview&nbsp;Hunter&nbsp;Biden&nbsp;on Dec. 8, 2020, after top Secret Service officials and the&nbsp;Biden&nbsp;transition team were&nbsp;notified of the&nbsp;plan.
The&nbsp;former&nbsp;agent, who retired last year after more than 20 years with the&nbsp;agency, told investigators that&nbsp;he&nbsp;was frustrated over the&nbsp;decision by more senior officials to block the&nbsp;interview but didn't consider the&nbsp;outcome problematic.
"I wasn't&nbsp;aware&nbsp;of political&nbsp;interference, personally," the&nbsp;former&nbsp;agent&nbsp;said.
Republicans pointed to the&nbsp;testimony as evidence that the&nbsp;Justice Department intervened to delay the&nbsp;Hunter&nbsp;Biden&nbsp;probe, even though the&nbsp;events took place while Republican President Donald Trump was in office.
"Tipping off the&nbsp;transition team and&nbsp;not&nbsp;being able to interview&nbsp;Hunter&nbsp;Biden&nbsp;as planned are just a couple of examples that reveal the&nbsp;Justice Department's misconduct in the&nbsp;Biden&nbsp;criminal investigation," House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer said in a statement on Monday when the&nbsp;committee released the&nbsp;transcript.
Comer said the&nbsp;alleged misconduct occurred under U.S. Attorney David Weiss, a Trump appointee who was named special counsel in the&nbsp;Hunter&nbsp;Biden&nbsp;investigation last week over the&nbsp;objections of many House Republicans including Comer.
Hunter&nbsp;Biden&nbsp;in July pleaded&nbsp;not&nbsp;guilty to charges of failing to pay taxes on more than $1.5 million in income in 2017 and 2018 despite owing more than $100,000.&nbsp;He&nbsp;did&nbsp;not&nbsp;enter a plea in a separate case where&nbsp;he&nbsp;is charged with unlawfully owning a firearm while using illegal drugs, which is a felony.
The&nbsp;former&nbsp;agent&nbsp;said investigators had planned to surprise&nbsp;Hunter&nbsp;Biden&nbsp;with their interview request, but first had to&nbsp;notify the&nbsp;Secret Service, which had begun protecting the&nbsp;son of the&nbsp;then-president-elect days earlier.
In the&nbsp;end, both&nbsp;FBI&nbsp;and Secret Service&nbsp;headquarters were&nbsp;notified about the&nbsp;interview plan, the&nbsp;interviewers' access to&nbsp;Hunter&nbsp;Biden&nbsp;was blocked and the&nbsp;former&nbsp;FBI&nbsp;agent&nbsp;heard from an attorney for&nbsp;Hunter&nbsp;Biden.
&nbsp;
(Reporting by David Morgan; Editing by Scott Malone and Howard Goller)

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Former FBI agent says he was not aware of interference in Hunter Biden probe