Democrats unsuccessfully sought an immediate US House inquiry into whether Republican lawmakers leveling accusations of corruption against presidential son Hunter Biden were misled by an informant who is now charged with working secretly for the Chinese Communist Party.

Their demand followed the unsealing Monday of a federal indictment charging Gal Luft — the purported whistleblower — with arms trafficking, breaking US sanctions against Iran, making false charges to federal agents and operating as an unregistered foreign agent of the Chinese Communist Party.

House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, a Republican, who rejected the request for a probe, responded that Luft “is a credible witness to the Biden’s influence-peddling schemes” because he said both men received payments from the same company allegedly linked to the Chinese Communist Party.

But Representative Jamie Raskin, the top-ranking Democrat on the panel, released a letter Wednesday seeking an investigation into whether the panel was “unwittingly duped by Mr. Luft in furtherance of the CCP’s interests.”

But Raskin, joined by Democratic Representative Dan Goldman, questioned whether Luft sought special “whistleblower” witness status from Comer and Congress in an effort intended to shield himself from criminal prosecution or to further Chinese interests in undermining President Joe Biden.

They criticized Senator Ron Johnson, a Wisconsin Republican, for urging Luft be granted immunity from prosecution in “order to help Republicans attack President Biden.”

Luft, a dual US-Israeli national, fled after being released on bail following arrest in Cyprus in February and has since been a fugitive.