Month: May 2022

Guardian says House Jan. 6 committee to hold six public hearings in June, but is that enough?

Posted on by Charles Jay

The Guardian is reporting that the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol attack is planning to hold six public hearings in June on how Donald Trump and some allies broke the law in their efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. But Rick Wilson, a former top GOP strategist and the co-founder of The Lincoln Project, sounded alarm bells, saying the committee members are not putting enough effort into making their case to the public.

The British newspaper, citing sources familiar with the inquiry, said it had reviewed a draft schedule prepared by the House committee. The first hearing is scheduled for June 9 and the last hearing on June 23 will be televised in prime time.

The Guardian wrote:

We want to paint a picture as clear as possible as to what occurred,” the chairman of the select committee, Congressman Bennie Thompson, recently told reporters. “The public needs to know what to think. We just have to show clearly what happened on January 6.”

The select committee has already alleged that Trump violated multiple federal laws to overturn the 2020 election, including obstructing Congress and defrauding the United States. But the hearings are where the panel intends to show how they reached those conclusions.

According to the draft schedule, the June public hearings will explore Trump’s efforts to overturn the election, starting and ending with prime-time hearings at 8 pm on the 9th and the 23rd. In between, the panel will hold 10 am hearings on the 13th, 15th, 16th and 21st.

The Guardian said the schedule is still subject to change. The two prime-time hearings are scheduled to last between one-and-a-half and two hours, while the four other morning hearings will last between two and two-and-a-half hours.

Each hearing will be led by a select committee member, the sources told the newspaper, but the questioning of witnesses who have been subpoenaed to appear will be primarily conducted by the committee’s top investigative lawyers. The investigators also intend to use flash texts, photos, and videos to illustrate the testimony, the sources said.

The Guardian report added that the panel will lay out how the efforts to overturn the election results unfolded over a 65-day period from the time Trump falsely claimed victory until Jan. 6:

The select committee is expected, for instance, to run through how the Trump White House appeared to coordinate the illegal plan to send fake electors to Congress, the plot to seize voting machines, and the unlawful plan to delay the certification of Biden’s win.

The panel is also expected to chart the reactivation of the Stop the Steal movement by the Trump activist Ali Alexander and associates, and how he applied for a permit to protest near the Capitol on January 6 but never held the “Wild Protest” and instead went up the Capitol steps.

The select committee additionally intends to address the question of intent, such as why Trump deliberately misled the crowd that he would march with them to the Capitol, and why he resisted entreaties to call off the rioters from obstructing the joint session on January 6.

The sources said the current schedule calls for capping off the six hearings with a close examination of video footage of leaders of the extremist Oath Keepers and Proud Boys groups meeting in a parking lot on Jan. 5 and their activities at the Capitol.

The sources said the select committee wants to draw a connection between “Trump’s political plan for January 6 and the militia groups’ violence at the Capitol in what could form evidence that Trump oversaw an unlawful conspiracy.”

Wilson sharply criticized the committee’s plan to only hold six hearings in a Twitter thread:

“SIX HEARINGS? SIX? Are. You. F*cking. Kidding. Me?" before adding, "Does no one understand the ballgame here?"

2/ Does no one understand the ballgame here? The witnesses from the Trump world will filibuster, bullshit, evade and jerk themselves off on live TV for roughly 40% of the hearings. Everyone will have a long statement at the opening.

— Rick Wilson (@TheRickWilson) May 23, 2022

Wilson went on to say: "You have to create a spectacle. You have to make people care. You have to have drama. You have to drag and grind the people who tried to do this so long and so hard their knees bleed. A coup attempt that goes unpunished is a training exercise."

And he warned that should the GOP take control over Congress next year, they will hold months of hearings on Hunter Biden’s laptop, begin impeachment proceedings against President Joe Biden for failing to secure the border, and hold months of “show trials” on Afghanistan or antifa.

4/ I PROMISE you, if the GOP was in charge of this, the hearings would NEVER, EVER, EVER stop. cc: @kurtbardella @TaraSetmayer Six hearings means the GOP will try to disrupt them (see Gaetz et al previously) and the Democrats will mumble their objections.

— Rick Wilson (@TheRickWilson) May 23, 2022

Just for comparison’s sake, the Senate Watergate Committee headed by Democratic Sen. Sam Ervin of North Carolina began holding public hearings on May 17, 1973. In all, the committee held 51 days of public hearings, a total of 319 hours, before issuing its final report on June 27, 1974.

Here are highlights of that Senate committee’s hearings:

YouTube Video

In May 1974, the House Judiciary Committee began holding formal impeachment hearings against President Richard M. Nixon, and in late July approved three articles of impeachment. Nixon resigned in August 1974 before he could be impeached in a House vote.

Of course, now we probably don’t have that amount of time to hold extended public hearings given the looming midterm elections, but the question is whether the House committee is allowing enough time to make its case to the American public.

January 6 Committee To Hold Public Hearings – Chairman Declares ‘The Public Needs to Know What to Think’

Posted on by Rusty Weiss

The House Select Committee investigating the January 6th riot at the Capitol is reportedly set to hold six public hearings – two in primetime – alleging former President Donald Trump and his associates broke the law in trying to overturn the 2020 election results.

The hearings will be held in June, according to the Guardian, which first reported the news.

Calling it a “pivotal political moment for the country,” the outlet reports that the panel will attempt to “publicly outline the potentially unlawful schemes that tried to keep the former president in office despite his defeat at the hands of Joe Biden.”

Congressman Bennie Thompson, the chairman of the select committee, gave the game away in his remarks regarding the public hearings about January 6th.

“We want to paint a picture as clear as possible as to what occurred,” Thompson (D-MS) told reporters. “The public needs to know what to think. We just have to show clearly what happened on January 6.”

RELATED: McConnell Agrees With Democrats, Media That January 6 Was A ‘Violent Insurrection,’ Rips RNC For Censuring Cheney, Kinzinger

Public Hearings on Capitol Riot

“The public needs to know what to think.”

Isn’t that the Democrat party Summed up completely in an 8-word sentence?

The biggest question on everyone’s mind is, with 6 public hearings ranging between 1.5 to 2.5 hours in length, will Adam Kinzinger have enough tissues on hand?

Rick Wilson, a one-time GOP strategist turned fervent Never Trumper, was also shedding tears over news that the January 6 committee would be holding 6 public hearings.

In Wilson’s eyes, that’s not enough.

“SIX HEARINGS? SIX? Are. You. F***ing. Kidding. Me?” he wrote.

In a follow-up tweet, Wilson claimed Trump witnesses would “filibuster, bulls***, evade and jerk themselves off on live TV” in an attempt to stonewall the hearings.

RELATED: Former AG Bill Barr Wants Republicans To ‘Move On’ From Trump, Blames Him For Capitol Riot

Setting Up the Narrative

Reports back in April indicated Thompson and the committee were prepared to hold eight public hearings on the January 6th riot at the Capitol.

So, according to the sources involved, this would be a streamlining of the attempts by the committee to influence opinions of what happened that day.

Aside from having the goal of telling the American people what to think, the June hearings will allow time for a full report to be released just in time for the midterm elections.

“The panel … plans to release a full report about the deadly attack on the Capitol in early fall,” CBS News reported at the time. 

Similar to Thompson’s comments, committee member Jamie Raskin (D-MD) said the public hearings would be divided into chapters “that will allow for the unfolding of the narrative.”

As any good work of fiction would.

Raskin, of course, never was the subject of a public hearing about trying to overturn election results, despite objecting to counting electoral votes back in 2016.

The Guardian reports that sources have indicated that “committee attorneys will simultaneously flash texts, photos and videos to illustrate the testimony” during these public hearings.

This will be interesting since this same House Select committee admitted to doctoring a text message presented by Representative Adam Schiff as evidence at a hearing back in December.

The Guardian report notes that “the exact content and timings of the hearings are still subject to change.”

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Nearly 70% Of Republicans Want Biden Impeached After 2022 Midterm Elections

Posted on by Becky Noble

As the November midterm elections inch closer, Americans’ struggle everyday with inflation and increasing gas and food prices with no end in sight.

Needless to say, that doesn’t bode well for those who are in charge – but it also has the effect of energizing the opposition.

A new UMass Amherst/YouGov poll shows that should Republicans retake Congress this fall after the midterm election, 68% of Republicans want President Joe Biden impeached.

And if the nation’s economic woes continue, that number is likely to climb.

RELATED: Hillary Clinton’s Campaign Manager Drops Bombshell Admission That She Personally Approved Press Leak Of Trump-Russia Allegation

Poll Highlights

Of those polled, over two-thirds of Republicans want Biden charged with “treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.” 

As many would guess, the issue that’s by far top-of-mind for most voters is the economy. (Though for Democrat voters, while the economy takes top billing at 22%, the next ‘most important issue’ is ‘climate change’ at 20%.) 

Immigration takes second billing, followed by abortion and health care. 

Broken down by party, the top issues for Republican voters are the economy, immigration, and abortion. 

For Democrats, it’s the economy, climate change, and abortion. 

For independents: the economy, health care, and immigration.

RELATED: EPA Spent $5.3M In COVID Aid On ‘Environmental Justice’ Programming

‘Multiple Grounds’ 

The way the Republicans see it, there are plenty of reasons to bring charges of impeachment against Joe Biden, and it has been talked about for a while.

Back in January on his podcast, Texas Senator Ted Cruz gave one of the strongest arguments for a Biden impeachment:

“Probably the most compelling is the utter lawlessness of President Biden’s refusal to enforce the border. His decision to just defy federal immigration laws and allow 2 million people to come here unimpeded in direct contravention of his obligation under Article 2 of the Constitution to take care that the laws be faithfully executed. That is probably the strongest grounds right now for impeachment, but there may be others.”

Even as far back as fall of 2021, a group of Republicans did file articles of impeachment after the disastrous pullout of American forces from Afghanistan. Rep. Bob Gibbs (R-OH) tweeted at the time,

“I filed articles of impeachment against @POTUS based on what I believe to be clear violations of his duties. There are dynamics in Congress preventing this from being debated. But I could not stand by while Biden commits flagrant & deliberate violations of his oath of office.”

Several other items that could trigger impeachment proceedings are possible hearings looking into the foreign business dealings of Biden’s son Hunter, and what if any involvement the President had in those deals.

POLL: Should President Biden be impeached?

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RELATED: If You Expected Bitcoin To Mimic Gold, You Haven’t A Clue About Gold

Other Biden Worries

Joe Biden and the Democrats have plenty to worry about way before any impeachment proceedings. A new Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Research poll shows Biden’s approval ratings at a dismal 39%.

When broken down by issues, the numbers are still as bad. On things like the economy and the Russian-Ukraine conflict, more Americans disapprove of Biden’s job performance than approve.

Joe Biden is also rapidly losing a previously reliable Democrat demographic. Approval among Hispanics has dropped to 26%, while a whopping 60% disapprove. 

Rep. Bob Good of Virginia may have given the best insight into what Republicans plans might be if they win big in 2022. He stated,

“I believe Joe Biden has intentionally done more to harm the country than any president in American history with the border situation. He deserves to be impeached for that alone, let alone anything else.”

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Highlights from The Downballot: Primary recaps and ‘a double whammy of BS’ in New York

Posted on by Dorothy He
This week on The Downballot, hosts David Beard and David Nir were joined by political strategist and fellow elections expert Joe Sudbay to recap a plethora of primary results. They covered, among other things:
  • Madison Cawthorn losing in North Carolina
  • The GOP nominating QAnon ally Doug Mastriano for governor, and the still-undecided Republican battle for the U.S. Senate nomination in Pennsylvania
  • A fantastic win for an Oregon progressive who'd be the state's first Latino member of Congress—which was also a humiliating loss for a crypto-backed super PAC that spent massively on another candidate
The group also discussed DCCC chair Sean Patrick Maloney’s inexplicable, selfish decision to run in a new district where three-quarters of the residents are already represented by a progressive Black freshman, Mondaire Jones.
You can listen below, or subscribe to The Downballot wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also find a transcript for this week right here. New episodes come out every Thursday!

All eyes were on North Carolina this week, where a prominent U.S. Senate Republican primary contest saw Rep. Ted Budd easily defeat former Gov. Pat McCrory, by about 59% to 25%. This ended up not being a close race at all, Beard noted. In November, Budd will face former state Supreme Court Chief Justice Cheri Beasley, who narrowly lost reelection in 2020 by about 400 votes. “She is primed to go forward and take on Budd there. She had very nominal primary competition and won in a huge landslide,” Beard added.

In North Carolina’s 13th District, which lacked an incumbent, both parties had primaries. On the Democratic side, state Sen. Wiley Nickel easily defeated former state Sen. Sam Searcy, 52% to 23%. The Republican contest featured a plethora of candidates, but one candidate, former North Carolina state football player Bo Hines, managed to eke out 32% of the vote—just above North Carolina's 30% barrier to avoid a runoff.

Looking over at the opposite coast at Oregon, Nir and Beard highlighted another incumbent who is, as of right now, on track to lose: Blue Dog Democratic Rep. Kurt Schrader in Oregon's redrawn 5th District. Schrader once infamously dissented on impeaching Donald Trump, likening his impeachment to a “lynching.” He is currently trailing progressive attorney Jamie McLeod-Skinner. As Nir explained, as of recording this episode on Wednesday evening, Schrader was down 61-39% with around 40,000 votes counted. However, a very large number of votes remain untallied in what is more or less his home base of Clackamas County, and those ballots are going to be slow to be counted. However, the back-of-the-envelope consensus, Nir notes, is that Schrader has way too much ground to make up and that McLeod-Skinner is going to be the likely winner: “If [McLeod-Skinner] is [the winner], either way this remains a somewhat competitive district. It leans blue. It got a little bit bluer, in fact, in redistricting, thanks to Democrats, but the real news will be replacing a moderate like Schrader with a much more progressive alternative.”

At this point, Nir and Beard welcomed Sudbay to the show to discuss some of the bigger pieces of news to come out of the recent primaries.

Sudbay started with Pennsylvania, where a gubernatorial race exposed the chaos happening among Republicans. On the Democratic side, state Attorney General Josh Shapiro ran unopposed. For Repubicans, however, things look very different, as Sudbay elaborated:

They have elected, they have nominated one of the craziest, most extreme politicians that we have seen in a very, very long time. He's basically a Christian ideologist nationalist. I mean, Doug Mastriano was at the January 6th event. He is really Trumpier than Trump, which, that's kind of getting out there. But this guy, I'll tell you one of the ways I knew Republicans were freaking out … A lot of Republican donors said if Mastriano wins, they're going to support Shapiro. The other thing that happened is there was this frenzied effort to try to maybe back Lou Barletta, who used to be a member of Congress; before that he was the mayor of Hazleton. [Barletta is] one of the most extreme anti-immigrant politicians around—well, I mean, he’s just normal now for the Republican Party, but he used to be extreme in the GOP. He lost the Senate race by about 13 or 14 points in 2018. That's how desperate they were—they decided maybe Lou Barletta would be their savior. So they've got Mastriano now.

Turning to the Republican primary in North Carolina’s 11th District, which garnered a storm of media attention due to a steady drumbeat of media coverage of incumbent Madison Cawthorn’s past indiscretions, the hosts shared their thoughts on how the Republican establishment—in a rare moment for today’s GOP—succeeded in pushing back against growing extremism in their party. As Sudbay put it, “It was interesting, because every time there was a new revelation—and there were numerous revelations over the past few weeks about him—[Cawthorn] would tweet, ‘The Libs are trying to destroy me.’ No, dude. It was the Republicans that were trying to destroy you, and the Republicans did.”

The trio also revisited Oregon, where, thanks to population growth, Democrats won a new House seat in reapportionment, leading to the creation of the blue-leaning 6th District, a brand-new open seat. Andrea Salinas won the Democratic primary here. “Democrats unexpectedly had a completely bonkers, out of control and, I will say, obscene primary that really should never have happened. But the good news is the good guys won. So what went down?” Nir asked.

Sudbay recalled that the entire race saw a basically unprecedented amount of money being spent by Sam Bankman-Fried, a crypto billionaire who was financing Carrick Flynn, an artificial intelligence researcher with no prior electoral experience:

Oh my God. The amount of money that was spent in this race by, I call him a crypto brother, who had a super PAC to elect a … I'm just going to call him sort of a no-name Democrat. And also the other thing that really struck me on this one: this crypto bro super PAC is spending money in a bunch of places. And like you said, fortunately, Andrea Salinas won. She will be the first Latina to represent Oregon.

But the other thing that happened was the House Majority PAC decided to invest in this race against her, well, for the other Democrat, which I know I keep not mentioning his name, but I am just so amazed that this was the race they chose to get into. And it really pissed off the … the Democratic House congressional caucus, because they were spending money to defeat a woman who's ... a great Democrat. She's been a state rep, she worked for Harry Reid, and it's like, where did that strategy come from? I just don't get it. I don't get that amount of spending … it was just bizarre to watch.

“It was totally bizarre,” Nir agreed, noting that “our guests from HMP came on before we learned about their decision to put $1 million in this race.” What’s more, he explained that there has been a lot of speculation that HMP made that investment because Sam Bankman-Fried, the crypto billionaire, actually runs an ‘exchange’ for cryptocurrency, and that he had possibly offered to give a donation to HMP in exchange for them getting involved on behalf of his favorite candidate. “We won't know until Friday at the soonest, which is when the next financial reports are due for super PACs like that, but it will cast a cloud over this race, no matter what,” Nir added.

The total spending for Carrick Flynn came close to $15 million for only around 15,000 or so votes—meaning that he spent $1,000 per vote. The race has not been called yet, with Salinas leading Flynn 36-18%, as Nir said: “I hope we don't see this kind of thing happen again. I'm not optimistic but this is a pretty humiliating outcome for the $15 million gang.”

In New York, the court-appointed expert released a new congressional map earlier this week that makes radical changes to existing districts. Right after this map dropped, Democratic Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney announced that instead of running in the district where three-quarters of his constituents currently live, he would run one district to the south, where only a quarter of his constituents live and where three-quarters of the constituents are represented by a progressive Black freshman, Mondaire Jones. “What the hell is Sean Patrick Maloney thinking?” Nir wondered.

Sudbay replied:

I think Sean Patrick Maloney thinks about Sean Patrick Maloney first and foremost and only. And that sounds kind of harsh, but that's just who he has been. As you mentioned, he chairs the DCCC, which should be solely focused on expanding the Democrats’ margin this year. And instead, he put himself first. I saw a tweet today from Jake Sherman, who does Punchbowl News, which I refer to as one of ... the Capitol Hill gossip publications. But he said, ‘Sean Maloney allies are spreading the message that Jones would be ideologically better suited for another district.’

Richie Torres, another member of Congress from New York, retweeted that and said, ‘The thinly veiled racism here is profoundly disappointing. A Black man is ideologically ill-suited to represent a Westchester County district that he represents presently and won decisively in 2020? Outrageous.’

Nir added that Maloney’s move could have ripple effects, as there are a couple of other ways this “really selfish move” could affect his colleagues:

First off, and this one is, in a way, the most important to me, is that by abandoning New York's 18th Congressional District—instead wanting to run in the 17th—he's making it more likely that we'll lose the 18th. And that's completely unforgivable. But just as unforgivable is that he wants Mondaire Jones to run in the 16th District. Well, that district is also represented by a first-term, progressive Black man, Jamaal Bowman. Maloney is trying to both risk a vulnerable seat, the 18th, and reduce representation among Black progressive men, by pushing them into a primary against one another. It's really a double whammy of BS.

The Downballot comes out every Thursday everywhere you listen to podcasts. As a reminder, you can reach our hosts by email at thedownballot@dailykos.com. Please send in any questions you may have for next week's mailbag. You can also reach out via Twitter: @DKElections.

Senate unanimously confirms Brink as Ukraine ambassador

Posted on by By Andrew Desiderio

The Senate on Wednesday night unanimously confirmed career Foreign Service officer Bridget Brink to serve as U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, putting an end to Washington’s three-year stretch without a Senate-confirmed envoy in Kyiv.

Brink, who currently serves as the U.S. ambassador to Slovakia, sailed through the Senate confirmation process as lawmakers on both sides of the aisle emphasized the urgency of having a top diplomat in the country while it’s under assault from Russia.

“To have an ambassador there at this critical time as the United States continues to help the Ukrainian people … is a wonderful thing, is a good thing, and will help advance the cause of peace, security and freedom,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said after Brink was confirmed. “I have every confidence she will be an outstanding ambassador.”

Brink’s confirmation comes on the same day the U.S. formally reopened its embassy in the Ukrainian capital. It had been shuttered since Russia’s invasion began in February.

The last Senate-confirmed ambassador to Ukraine, Marie Yovanovitch, was removed by Donald Trump in 2019 as the then-president was seeking an investigation into his political rivals. The saga led to Trump’s first impeachment.

Brink has served in several roles in the diplomatic corps, including as a deputy assistant secretary in the State Department’s Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs. She speaks Russian and has served at U.S. embassies in Serbia, Cyprus, Georgia and Uzbekistan.

At Schumer’s direction, the Foreign Relations Committee fast-tracked Brink’s nomination. Her confirmation hearing took place last week, and the committee reported her favorably to the Senate floor earlier Wednesday. In a matter of hours, all 100 senators agreed to confirm her to the post.

Posted in Uncategorized

Markwayne Mullin, self-professed Jan. 6 hero, tries to codify Big Lie and expunge Trump impeachment

Posted on by Joan McCarter

Rep. Markwayne Mullin (R-OK) is trying to codify the Big Lie and expunge the second impeachment of the former guy. The Hill obtained a copy of Mullin’s draft legislation, which asserts that the charge against Trump for incitement of insurrection  “contains a subjective account of that which transpired at the Capitol on January 6, 2021.”

Because what the entire world witnessed on their television sets for hour upon hour on Jan. 6…  wasn’t as bad as it looked? This is a particularly interesting reimagining of history because Markwaye went to great pains to highlight his own heroics as the MAGA army of orcs attacked on January 6. He told Politico a few weeks later that he “first leapt into action, helping an officer barricade the door on the House floor that leads to Statuary Hall.”

“The idea was just to try to delay. I honestly didn’t believe we were going to keep them out of the chamber. I was 100 percent convinced that we were going to pile up at the door,” Mullin told Politico. “It is all about time,” he added. He described how he broke up wooden hand sanitizer stands to create some kind of weapon, giving a piece of wood to Texas freshman Rep. Troy Nehls. “We have a choice. I’m with you, brother,” Mullin said he told Nehls.

Then he described how he attempted to try to talk the invaders down. “You almost got shot. You almost died. Is it worth it?’” he said he asked them. Someone in the mob supposedly helped back “This is our House. This is our House. And we’re taking our House back.’” Mullin told Politico he shot back with “This is our House, too. That is not going to happen.”

But in retrospect, all those heroics must have been overblown, because it was just an overly zealous attempt to exercise free speech on the part of those Trump supporters. Or something. Mullin’s big argument in the legislation is that the impeachment arcticles “omits any discussion of the circumstances, unusual voting patterns, and voting anomalies of the 2020 Presidential election itself.” Mullin was among the Republicans who challenged the electoral vote count on Jan. 6, even after his action-figure heroics were called upon earlier in the day.

Mullin was expected to introduce the bill Wednesday. In an email to fellow Republican House members Tuesday, reported by the Daily Beast, Mullin’s office wrote, “The Democrats’ weaponization of impeachment against President Trump cannot go unanswered in the history books.” The bill decries the “rabid partisanship the Democrats displayed in exercising one of the most grave and consequential powers with which the House is charged.”

“Democrats used their second impeachment resolution to once again weaponize one of the most grave and consequential powers of the House,” Mullin said in a statement. “This was never about the Constitution; it was rooted in personal politics.”

“Liberals couldn’t see through their blind rage long enough to follow parliamentary procedure, and instead barreled through Congress in order to have one more bite at the apple with President Trump,” said Mullin.

You don’t have to look too hard to find Mullin’s motivation in pushing this bill—which, by the way, will not get anywhere near the House floor as long as Democrats hold the chamber. Mullin is running for the seat being vacated by Sen. Jim Inhofe in June’s special election. Trump hasn’t endorsed yet in the crowded Republican primary.

Back in April, Mullin made the Mar-a-Lago pilgrimage to beg for his ruler’s favor. He and Trump “discussed the state of the economy and the upcoming election,” Mullin’s campaign said. Sure.

Not to be outdone by Mullin in the Trump genuflection contest, the perfectly odious Elise Stefanik jumped on board. “The American people know Democrats weaponized the power of impeachment against President Donald Trump to advance their own extreme political agenda,” she told Fox News Digital. “President Donald Trump was rightfully acquitted, and it is past time to expunge Democrats’ sham smear against not only President Trump’s name, but against millions of patriots across the country.”

Stefanik, Mullin introduce House resolution to expunge second Trump impeachment

Posted on by Tyler Olson
House GOP Conference Chair Elise Stefanik and nearly 30 other Republicans are getting behind a resolution that would "expunge" former President Donald Trump's second impeachment.

Abbreviated Pundit Roundup: Critical race theory? Nah. The story is the great replacement scam

Posted on (Updated by Greg Dworkin

Bess Levin/Vanity Fair:

REPUBLICANS ARE FURIOUS PEOPLE REMEMBER THEY’VE BEEN PUSHING THE RACIST “GREAT REPLACEMENT” RHETORIC FOR YEARS

In the era of Donald Trump, a major plank of the modern Republican Party platform is outright racism. Whether it’s the leader of the free world telling four congresswomen of color to “go back” to the “totally broken and crime-infested places from which they came,” a U.S. senator saying he wasn’t afraid of the January 6 rioters but would have been worried if they were Black Lives Matter protesters, a U.S. congresswoman speaking at event put on by a white nationalist, the complete and total hysteria over the idea of children being taught about systemic racism, or a prime-time conservative host’s regular white-power hour, this hateful little ecosystem just loves to appeal to the lowest common denominator by demonizing anyone who isn’t white. But when their actions actually have consequences? And it turns out their hate speech matters? And people have the audacity to suggest they’re part of the problem? Well, they really get their noses out of joint.

Imagine if Trump were President now and Flynn the National Security Adviser…. https://t.co/CQ32e8xSSO

— Phillips P. OBrien (@PhillipsPOBrien) May 17, 2022

The New York Times:

Republicans Play on Fears of ‘Great Replacement’ in Bid for Base Voters

Republicans across the spectrum were quick to denounce the killings. But fewer party leaders appeared willing to break with the politics of nativism and fear the party has embraced to retain the loyalties of right-wing voters inspired by Donald J. Trump.

One Republican, Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming, on Monday called out her colleagues for not doing enough to squash the extremist wing of her own party.

“House GOP leadership has enabled white nationalism, white supremacy, and anti-Semitism,” Ms. Cheney, the former No. 3 House Republican who was removed from that role over her criticism of Mr. Trump, wrote on Twitter. “History has taught us that what begins with words ends in far worse. @GOP leaders must renounce and reject these views and those who hold them.”

The victims of the terrorist attack in #Buffalo haven’t been buried yet, as Orbán refers to the Great Replacement conspiracy theory in opening speech of new term as PM. Many international media don’t even mention it!!!https://t.co/cCgvOzhCAg

— Cas Mudde 😷 (@CasMudde) May 17, 2022

Insider:

Mitch McConnell refuses to condemn racist 'great replacement theory' three separate times in one press conference

  • Some Republicans have promoted a version of the "replacement theory" that motivated the Buffalo shooter.
  • Insider and 2 other reporters repeatedly asked McConnell about the theory, but he wouldn't denounce it.
  • He said racism "ought to be stood up to by everybody, both Republicans and Democrats."

In early 2021, @elizagriswold told me she wanted to write about the rise of Christian nationalism through a little-known Pennsylvania state senator. I grumbled a bit about it. But now Doug Mastriano is the Republican GOP nominee for governor. https://t.co/Z7AbKdBlIk

— Michael Luo (@michaelluo) May 18, 2022

TPM:

How Christian Nationalism And The Big Lie Fused To Fuel Doug Mastriano’s Candidacy

That the Christian right is intertwined with a Republican candidate is hardly new. Since Ronald Reagan’s election in 1980, the movement has defined GOP politics. What is new, and increasingly perilous, is that over the ensuing years the movement has become more highly radicalized, a trend that was validated and accelerated by Trump’s candidacy and presidency — and especially by his stolen election lie. A movement that elevated Trump to messianic status and shielded him from his 2019 impeachment was able to convince millions that satanic forces had robbed God’s man in the White House of his anointed perch as the restorer of America’s white Christian heritage. Their duty, as patriotic spiritual warriors, was to go to battle on his behalf.

NEW: Ukraine aid splinters GOP. With the nationalist camp growing larger and louder, most Hill Republicans — from rank & file up to McConnell — are aggressively pushing back on what they see as a disturbing trend toward isolationism.https://t.co/bGcNz5sr91

— Andrew Desiderio (@AndrewDesiderio) May 17, 2022

The Guardian:

Fox News suddenly goes quiet on ‘great replacement’ theory after Buffalo shooting

Suspect was allegedly motivated by the theory, but network has barely mentioned gunman’s reasoning, even after Tucker Carlson pushed the concept in more than 400 of his shows

Fox News, according to Oliver Darcy, a media correspondent for CNN, “largely ignored” the fact that the shooter had been inspired by replacement theory. Darcy searched transcripts from Fox News’s shows, and found one brief mention, by Fox News anchor Eric Shawn.

As Americans absorbed news of the shooting and struggled to understand why it had happened, it seemed a glaring omission. But given Carlson and his colleagues’ promotion of the theory, which has been unchecked by Fox News’s top executives, experts see the network as being left in a bind.

“What can they say?” said Matt Gertz, senior fellow at Media Matters for America, a watchdog of rightwing media. “There’s no way for anyone at Fox News to really issue a convincing and compelling, forthright denunciation of great replacement theory, because it’s being discussed on the network’s primetime hour on a near constant basis.”

Finnish parliament votes: 🇫🇮 Independence declaration 1917 100-88 🇪🇺 EU membership 1994: 152-45 🪖 #Nato membership 2022: 188-8 https://t.co/dN7UwOUsaH

— adam seven 🇫🇮 🇪🇺 (@a7_FIN_SWE) May 17, 2022

NBC News:

Trump waded into GOP primaries. Democrats hope he sticks around.

The former president’s presence is being increasingly felt in Democrats’ midterm message as they look to leverage his divisiveness to their advantage in yet another election.

Donald Trump has inserted himself into the Republican primaries this week in Pennsylvania, much to the chagrin of some GOP members there, who think he may have picked the wrong candidates and needlessly shuffled the race.

Democrats, however, aren't so sure they've got a problem with the former president making himself an outsize figure in the races there or nationwide, as they try to leverage his divisiveness to their advantage in yet another election.

Democrats are largely still trying to settle on exactly what role Trump should play in their campaigns as they defend razor-thin majorities in the House and Senate this fall.

But there is a growing acknowledgement that leveraging voters’ lingering distaste from the Trump years may be among their best strategies for turning out their voters in November, particularly with their policy agenda falling short in areas like lowering the cost of prescription drugs and passing voting rights legislation.

I don’t think I’ve read a better summary of what US political journalists should be doing that also makes clear what a terrible job they’re doing now. By Dan @froomkin in @thenation https://t.co/fW74bz9LHj pic.twitter.com/mH9xOdZ3XH

— Will of the Northern Loons 🇺🇸🇸🇪🌻🇺🇦 (@WMRine) May 17, 2022

David Leonhardt/The New York Times:

The Right’s Violence Problem

The Buffalo killings are part of a pattern: Most extremist violence in the U.S. comes from the political right.

As this data shows, the American political right has a violence problem that has no equivalent on the left. And the 10 victims in Buffalo this past weekend are now part of this toll. “Right-wing extremist violence is our biggest threat,” Jonathan Greenblatt, the head of the ADL, has written. “The numbers don’t lie.”

What was Pompeo’s brain trust doing during the Jan. 6 insurrection? One of Pompeo’s State Department assistants was meeting these folks https://t.co/iMnwUtBavH

— Laura Rozen (@lrozen) May 17, 2022

Mullin legislation would expunge Trump Jan. 6 impeachment

Posted on (Updated by Emily Brooks

Rep. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.) is leading a resolution that aims to erase former President Trump’s second impeachment after the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack and repeats numerous arguments to cast doubt on the integrity of the 2020 election.

A copy of Mullin’s draft bill obtained by The Hill said that the incitement of insurrection impeachment charge “contains a subjective account of that which transpired at the Capitol on January 6, 2021” and “omits any discussion of the circumstances, unusual voting patterns, and  voting anomalies of the 2020 Presidential election itself.”

Mullin, a former mixed martial arts fighter, leaped into action to barricade doors to the House chamber during the Jan. 6 Capitol attack, making his move to erase Trump’s impeachment after the attack particularly notable.

In the several paragraphs the resolution spends addressing the 2020 election, it says that Trump won 18 of 19 so-called bellwether counties that have traditionally corresponded with the winner of the presidential election and that Trump won more votes than he did in 2016. It mentions voting rules changes due to the COVID-19 pandemic and recount efforts being "vociferously opposed" by officials in some states.

The fifth-term congressman is running for Senate in Oklahoma, as Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) is retiring. Trump has not endorsed in that race, and Inhofe endorsed his former chief of staff Luke Holland.

Mullin is expected to introduce the bill on Wednesday. His office sent an email to House Republican congressional offices on Tuesday seeking support for the resolution, multiple GOP offices confirmed. The Daily Beast first reported Mullin’s planned introduction of the impeachment expungement proposal.

This is the second resolution from Mullin to expunge a Trump impeachment. He previously introduced a measure in March to expunge the Dec. 18, 2019, impeachment of Trump over his encouraging Ukraine to investigate the business dealings of Hunter Biden, the son of President Biden, while discussing military aid to Ukraine. That measure got co-sponsorship from seven Republicans, including Rep. Ronny Jackson (Texas), Rep. Barry Moore (Ala.) and Rep. Greg Steube (Fla.). 

The Senate failed to reach the two-thirds majority required to convict Trump both times he was impeached.

The new resolution also takes issue with the process of the impeachment after Jan. 6, noting a lack of hearings and its hasty release. The fact that Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts did not preside over the Senate impeachment trial, it says, was “perfecting the entirety of the process as nothing more than an unconstitutional exercise in futility, moot, and fantastical political theater.”

Mullin declined to comment until after official introduction of the bill.