Lesley Wolf worked in relative obscurity for nearly 16 years as an assistant U.S. Attorney for the District of Delaware, but now the former federal prosecutor says she’s been threatened and harassed after Republicans falsely accused her of going easy on Hunter Biden.
In her prepared opening statement, released to the media, for a closed-door deposition demanded by House Republicans as part of the impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden, Wolf said:
“My desire to serve my community and my country, such a great source of pride, has recently come at significant cost. As a private person, the once routine and mundane details of my life have become the subject of public interest in an invasive and disturbing manner. Far worse, I have been threatened and harassed, causing me to fear for my own and my family’s safety.”
Her deposition on Thursday came a day after the House, on a party-line vote, formalized the Republican majority’s impeachment inquiry even though they haven’t found any evidence that the president benefited from his family’s foreign business dealings or accepted bribes.
On Friday, a federal jury in Washington awarded $148 million in damages to two former election workers in Georgia—Ruby Freeman and her daughter Wandrea “Shaye” Moss—for the harm caused to them by defamatory statements made against them by disgraced former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani following the 2020 election.
Wolf’s problems arose simply because she happened to work for Delaware U.S. District Attorney David C. Weiss, a Donald Trump appointee, who first began investigating Hunter Biden’s financial dealings in late 2018. President Biden retained Weiss in his post so that he could continue the investigation of his son.
Wolf was part of the team that initially worked out a plea deal with Hunter Biden on gun and tax charges this summer. Hunter Biden agreed to plead guilty to two misdemeanor counts of failing to pay his 2017 and 2018 taxes on time. He also agreed to terms to avoid prosecution on a felony charge alleging that he falsely asserted that he was sober when he bought a handgun in 2018.
But the plea deal collapsed due to differences over the scope of immunity that Hunter Biden would have received from future investigations. In August, Attorney General Merrick Garland elevated Weiss to special counsel status in the investigation. In September, Weiss’ office indicted Hunter Biden on three felony counts for allegedly illegally purchasing the handgun.
Then, earlier this month, Weiss obtained an indictment from a federal grand jury in California, charging Hunter Biden with nine tax-related criminal charges, including three felony counts. Hunter Biden’s lawyer, Abbe Lowell, said his client would not have been indicted if his surname were not Biden.
Hunter Biden has pleaded not guilty to all the charges. And there was nothing in either indictment related to his father.
The president’s son declined to appear for a closed-door deposition in the impeachment inquiry on Wednesday, holding a press conference outside the Capitol at which he said he would only testify in public—so Republicans couldn’t selectively leak excerpts from his testimony. House Republicans have threatened to hold him in contempt of Congress.
Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee—who himself refused a subpoena from the House Jan. 6 select committee—and other MAGA Republicans still feel that the DOJ has gone easy on Hunter Biden.
Whistleblowers from the IRS’ criminal division claimed in congressional testimony this year that Wolf blocked them from pursuing certain search warrants and generally disagreed with their plans to be more aggressive in investigating the Biden family.
“She limited what they could do in their investigation,” Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), one of the leaders of the impeachment effort, said on Fox News in June, shortly before requesting a transcribed interview with Wolf and other officials. Jordan subsequently sent Wolf a subpoena.
On Thursday, Wolf joined the ranks of other Justice Department officials who’ve said that politics had nothing to do with their decisions in the Hunter Biden case.
After the hearing, Jordan complained to reporters that Wolf had refused to answer most of the questions she was asked during the deposition., NBC News reported.
But in her prepared opening statement, Wolf broadly defended her work and said she was bound by DOJ policies not to discuss an ongoing investigation.
“At all times while serving as an AUSA, I acted consistently with the Justice Manual, DOJ policy directives, and my statutory/legal and ethical obligations. I followed the facts where they led, and made decisions in the best interests of the investigation. This includes, but is by no means limited to, policies and rules governing politically sensitive investigations, election year sensitivities, attorney search warrants, search warrant filter requirements, and professional conduct rules barring contact with represented parties.”
Wolf also revealed that she had recently left her post as a federal prosecutor, but said her decision “was long pre-dated and was unconnected to the baseless allegations against me.” She said she “agreed to stay with the office months longer than planned because of my belief that my family and I were safer when I remained an AUSA.”
Fox News did not mention this in its online story, nor did that story mention the threats Wolf said she has received as a result of the allegations against her. Instead, its story was headlined: “Jordan says former prosecutor who allegedly scuttled Hunter investigation 'refused' to answer questions.”
Rep. Glenn Ivey, a Maryland Democrat, attended the deposition and said that Republicans kept asking Wolf about the Hunter Biden case during the four-hour-plus deposition. Huffpost reported:
“They kept showing her documents and things that they knew that she couldn’t comment on, asking her questions about the ongoing investigation, even though they knew she couldn’t comment on it,” Ivey said in an interview with the outlet.
Ivey does not believe that Republicans deliberately incited harassment against Wolf, but he said it was “irresponsible” for lawmakers to be putting people’s names out in the public to the extent that they have.
“They know at this point that when they put people’s names out there and connect them in these types of investigations, and make suggestions about them being involved in cover-ups and things like that, they know that this is going to be a consequence of that,” Ivey said.
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Weiss voluntarily agreed to respond to the subpoena. She concluded her opening statement by observing all too accurately:
“I have no doubt that after today the threats and harassment and my own fear stemming from them will heighten exponentially. This not only scares me, but as someone who loves this country, it also breaks my heart. We are living in a day and age where politics and winning seem to be paramount and the truth has become collateral damage.”
A sad truth indeed.
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Tenor and soprano saxophonist and composer Grover Washington Jr. was born on Dec. 12, 1943, and joined the ancestors just five days after he celebrated his 56th birthday, on Dec. 17, 1999.
Some purist critics have disparaged his importance by pinning him as the founder of “smooth jazz” or “jazz fusion,” which in their opinions aren't jazz at all. Yet his album “Mister Magic” topped R&B and jazz charts while making waves in the pop genre as well.
Washington will always be honored as a musician that brought millions of fans to the music. And so it is only fitting that we also explore and celebrate Washington’s jazz and funk contributions to Black music history.
He deserves the title “Mr. Magic.”
”Black Music Sunday” is a weekly series highlighting all things Black music. With nearly 190 stories covering performers, genres, history, and more, each featuring its own vibrant soundtrack. I hope you’ll find some familiar tunes and perhaps an introduction to something new.
Washington’s biography, by Greg Mazurkiewicz for Musician’s Guide, covers his early years.
Born in Buffalo, Washington was encouraged to take up the instrument by his saxophonist father. He was barely in his teens when he joined a local R&B group, and, at 16, began five years of working with the Four Clefs. He then freelanced for a couple of years and played saxophone during his military service before settling in Philadelphia in 1967.
That city had a reputation for clubs that jumped to the sound of the Hammond organ, and that may have been behind his first break. Another case of last-minute substitutions saw him summoned by Charles Earland in 1971 to the Key Club in Newark, New Jersey, where the organist was about to perform a live date. The album, Living Black, contains the outstanding version of Killer Joe, on which Washington's forthright opening tenor solo does so much to create the right ambiance.
Already a mature soloist, with a command of the high register that became something of a trademark, Washington's success with Earland led to several similar recordings, including those led by organist Johnny Hammond Smith. After the success of his own Kudu albums, he finally gave up a day job wholesaling records and became one of the stars of a circuit that involved the likes of George Duke, Bob James, Marcus Miller and Steve Gadd, generally filed under a crossover or fusion heading.
Here’s that 1970 recording of “Killer Joe”:
Washington’s first album, “Inner City Blues,” was released on Kudu Records in 1971. Thom Jurek at All Music provides some background on the album’s creation in his review.
The story behind Grover Washington, Jr.'s first session date as a leader revolves around a sheer coincidence of being in the right place at the right time. The truth is, the date for Creed Taylor's Kudu imprint was supposed to feature Hank Crawford in the soloist's chair. Crawford couldn't make the date and longtime sideman Washington got the nod. His being closely affiliated with organists Charles Earland and Johnny Hammond didn't hurt, and his alto and tenor saxophones' tone was instantly noticeable for both its song-like quality and Washington's unique ability to dig deep into R&B territory for his expression of feeling. Released in 1971, produced by Taylor, and arranged and orchestrated by Bob James, the list of players in this band is equally impressive: James played Fender Rhodes, there's Richard Tee on organ, bassist Ron Carter, drummer Idris Muhammad, then-new guitarist Eric Gale, percussionist Airto Moreira, Thad Jones and Eugene Young on trumpets, trombonist Wayne Andre, and baritone saxophonist Don Ashworth. James also added a violin section and a small vocal chorus on certain tracks.
Inner City Blues kicks off with its title track, a burning version of the Marvin Gaye tune with Washington lending a heft and depth to it that reveals the sophistication of Gaye's original.
Here’s that title track!
Yet it was Washington’s fourth album, 1974’s “Mister Magic,” that was a commercial success, soaring to the top of jazz, soul, R&B, and pop charts. Here’s Washington performing the album’s title song, “Mister Magic,” live in concert on June 27, 1981, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Just listen to the roar of applause once people realize what song they’re about to hear.
In 1976, Washington moved in a different direction, as All Music’s Thom Jurek’s A Secret Place review explains.
Tenor and soprano saxophonist Grover Washington, Jr. was faced with an almost impossible task in 1976: following up his two [1974 and 1975] critically acclaimed and wildly successful commercial recordings Mister Magic and Feels So Good. Both recordings crossed over to R&B on the radio and on the charts.
[...]
Washington could have gone the easy route and followed up his R&B chart success with a series of uptempo, rousing tracks that leaned heavier on funk -- in the style of the title tracks of both the previous albums. But he went in a different direction, at least partially.
Here’s the full album:
In 1980, Washington released his hit album Winelight, which garnered him the 1982 Grammy for Best Jazz Fusion Performance. His collaboration with Bill Withers, on the iconic “Just The Two of Us” won the 1982 Grammy for Best Rhythm & Blues Song.
That’s so nice, gotta play it twice—this time with video of Bill Withers performing!
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Jakob Baekgaard at All About Jazz reviews the Columbia Records box set of Washington offerings, which includes vocalists.
Grover Washington Jr.: Sacred Kind of Love: The Columbia Recordings
His versatility is sometimes overlooked, but it shines through in a box set like this. When he plays jazz standards, he might add a big band orchestral flourish as he does in his reading of "When I Fall in Love," or he can do a pared-down-to-the essentials approach on "Nature Boy," where his gift for playing a melody comes to the fore. He can also do a playful electro take on Dave Brubeck's "Take Five." When it comes to vocalists there are elements of jazz, R&B and even a brief rap and he enlists singers as varied as Jean Carne, Phyllis Hyman, B.B. King and Freddy Cole. There is also a bit of Latin rhythm and bossa nova and Washington gets away with it all and still creates coherent albums with a distinctive sound. His sidemen include pianists Herbie Hancock and Hank Jones, bassist George Mraz and drummer Billy Hart. Sacred Kind of Love: The Columbia Recordings is a good place to start to grasp the quality and diversity of Grover Washington's music. A bonus: the box comes with thorough notes and bonus tracks. To quote one of the titles in the set, "Check Out Grover."
Here, Washington performs “Sacred Kind of Love” with Phyliss Hyman on “It's Showtime at the Apollo” in 1991:
From 1967 onward, Washington made his home in Philadelphia, where a mural honors his contribution to the city:
Ronald Atkins wrote in Washington’s 1999 obituary for The Guardian:
When not touring, Washington often helped young musicians in Philadelphia. His most recent big hit was the Next Exit album of 1992 that included Summer Chill, co-written by his son and nominated for a Grammy. Some of his higher profile gigs of recent years involved playing for President Clinton, who joined him on saxophone after one concert and said how honoured he felt to share the stage.
Washington's final TV show was broadcast on CBS the day after he died. He is survived by his wife Christine, a daughter and a son.
Here is the video documenting that last performance.
RIP, Mr. Magic.
Join me in the comments section below for more of Washington’s magic and as always, please post some of your favorites.
The Rudy Giuliani defamation trial is now over.
Rudy Giuliani hit with $148M verdict for defaming two Georgia election workers
An attorney for Ruby Freeman and her daughter, Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, had urged the eight-person jury to “send a message” with its verdict.
It was a unanimous decision by an eight-person jury. Giuliani deserved punitive damages, and the plaintiffs—Fulton County, Georgia, election workers Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss—deserve to be compensated.
The courts are saying that lying can be expensive. And Donald Trump’s fraud trial in New York is still yet to resolve (and it might send the same message).
In other news:
Neil Irwin/Axios:
What the Fed's rate policy pivot means for the economy
Why it matters: The end of the war on inflation is in sight. Barring some unpleasant economic surprises, the central bank is now prepared to take its foot off the brakes and move to a stance in which it is no longer actively trying to slow growth.
- Importantly, the majority of policymakers are now envisioning significant rate cuts in 2024, while also envisioning the economy remaining basically solid, with low unemployment and steady growth.
- In other words, rates will probably be coming down next year even in the absence of a severe downturn. That's a sweet spot both for financial markets and for families and businesses.
- The cycle of monetary tightening that has whipsawed markets and the economy for the last two years is, for all intents and purposes, over.
John Stoehr/The Editorial Board:
House Republicans ‘will regret’ voting for impeachment inquiry
An interview with the peerless Jill Lawrence.
Biden’s impeachment, which is imminent, is part of Trump’s vengeance movement. Fortunately, it’s being seen that way. Stories about it seem to have two critical features. One, that there’s no evidence linking Joe Biden to Hunter Biden’s businesses. Two, that beneath all the innuendo and conspiracy theory is an obsessive, driving force – a disgraced former president who’s still stinging from being impeached twice.
Since these impeachment proceedings are going to be based on nothing, one could say nothing will come of them – meaninglessness has no meaning. But that overlooks something important about the House GOP’s smear campaign. It represents fundamental weakness.
Craig Mauger/Detroit News:
In court, Michigan Republicans tie false elector effort to Donald Trump's campaign
While the Trump campaign has previously been tied to the overall strategy of crafting electoral certificates in seven battleground states, the testimony Thursday described campaign staffers as being involved in recruiting attendees and running the meeting of the false electors in Lansing on Dec. 14, 2020. During that gathering, 16 Republican activists signed a document that was used to claim the then-incumbent Republican president won Michigan's 16 electoral votes.
The revelations came on the second day of preliminary examinations for six of the Republican electors as Attorney General Dana Nessel's office pursues criminal forgery charges against those whose names appeared on the false certificate.
The Thousands of Local Elections That Will Shape Criminal Justice Policy in 2024
Counties across the nation are electing DAs and sheriffs next year. Bolts guides you through the early hotspots.
Local DAs like [Georgia’s Fani] Willis have become a key GOP target this year, as Republicans go after prosecutors who they think are standing in the way of their political or policy ambitions. New laws in Georgia and Texas give courts and state officials more authority to discipline DAs. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who is challenging Trump for the GOP’s presidential nomination, has over the last 18 months removed two Democratic prosecutors from office, angry over their policies like not prosecuting abortion.
The presidential election is also pulling sheriffs into its orbit. Far-right sheriffs have allied with election deniers, using local law enforcement to amplify Trump’s lies about 2020, ramp up investigations, and even threaten election officials. One such sheriff, Pinal County’s Mark Lamb, is now running for the U.S. Senate in Arizona, leaving his office open. Over in Texas, Tarrant County (Fort Worth) Sheriff Bill Waybourn inspired a new task force that will be policing how people vote while he runs for reelection next year.
With roughly 2,200 prosecutors and sheriffs on the 2024 ballot, voters will weigh in on county offices throughout the nation next year, settling confrontations over the shape of local criminal legal systems while also choosing the president and Congress.
Bolts today is launching its coverage with our annual overview of which counties will hold such races and when: Find our full list here.
Mike Johnson May Be the Next House Speaker to Lose His Job
- Conservatives warn Johnson against deals on Ukraine, shutdown
- Lawmakers due back just 10 days before next US funding lapse
House Speaker Mike Johnson is ending 2023 with an ominous preview of what to expect in the new year: dissension in his ranks that threatens to hamstring deals on US government funding, Ukraine war aid and border policy.
It could also cost him his job.
The Louisiana Republican, elected speaker in October after GOP hardliners ousted his predecessor for making deals with Democrats, sent the House home for the holidays on Thursday after passing a bipartisan defense policy bill over strong objections from 73 ultra-conservatives.
This YouTube lecture from New York Times analyst Nate Cohn on the state of polling is excellent:
House Republicans are entering a new phase in their potential impeachment of President Joe Biden — one that raises plenty of questions about what comes next.
The GOP investigation, which centers on the business deals of Hunter Biden and other family members, has yet to find any clear link between Joe Biden’s actions as president or vice president and his family’s financial arrangements. Despite that, every House Republican on Wednesday supported a formal inquiry to try to uncover a smoking gun.
That unity sent GOP lawmakers home from Washington with high spirits, even as the president and Democrats torched their efforts as a politically motivated sideshow.
Regardless of the substance of their impeachment inquiry, the vote to formalize it does give them more legal authority as they seek to enforce their subpoenas and records requests. It also creates a new set of hurdles for them to clear before they decide whether to pursue formal articles of impeachment.
Here’s a guide to the basics — and the complications — of the impeachment inquiry.
Congress has extremely wide latitude in what it chooses to investigate. But the House's vote to formalize an impeachment inquiry strengthens the probe’s legal power as its committees issue subpoenas and demand documents. It also sets parameters and assigns panels to lead the investigation.
The House has impeached a president before without a vote to greenlight an inquiry. Former President Donald Trump’s second impeachment, for example, saw articles introduced five days after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.
On the other side was the impeachment of former President Bill Clinton, when House Republicans voted not only to launch an inquiry, but again months later to expand the scope of the probe beyond what was in the initial resolution.
Former Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) eventually followed that formalizing model in 2019 for Trump's first impeachment. After months of unofficial investigations into Trump, she put an official launch of the inquiry into Trump to a vote on the House floor after pushback from the White House.
The technical answer here is no — Republicans have held depositions and received tens of thousands of documents already without a formal vote.
But as they’ve tried to lock down final interviews, they’ve gotten pushback from the White House, which is taking a page from an unusual corner: Trump's administration.
White House counsel Richard Sauber, in a letter last month, rebuffed House Republicans’ subpoena of a former White House counsel, pointing back to a January 2020 DOJ opinion. At the time, the Trump administration had pushed back on Pelosi’s decision to launch an impeachment inquiry without initially holding a vote, declaring Democrats’ demands invalid unless the chamber formally authorized them.
“[W]e conclude that the House must expressly authorize a committee to conduct an impeachment investigation and to use compulsory process in that investigation before the committee may compel the production of documents or testimony,” wrote Steven Engel, then the head of DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel.
Not necessarily. And in this case, it’s possible they skip the dramatic public hearings before drafting articles of impeachment.
Oversight Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) and Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), who are leading the inquiry, have not ruled out more hearings — and they’ve even said they are willing to do one with Hunter Biden if he sits for a closed-door deposition first. The inquiry resolution passed this week also lays out what those hearings would look like.
But as the two chairs plot out the final weeks of their investigation, they have a clear priority: finishing transcribed interviews and getting the rest of the documents they’ve requested. They are also preparing to go to court to compel testimony from two DOJ tax officials, and potentially also a former White House counsel.
Plus, Hunter Biden defied Republicans’ subpoena this week, showing up to the Capitol but skipping a closed-door interview. Rather than give in to his demands to hold a public hearing, Comer and Jordan have indicated they’ll likely push a vote to hold him in contempt of Congress.
Jordan referenced Trump’s first impeachment as a blueprint for how and when articles could be drafted for Biden — meaning that the Oversight Committee will likely issue a report and then, per the Ohio Republican, “the conference will make a decision on whether there’s articles.”
Ultimately, the decision to bring articles of impeachment to the floor rests with Speaker Mike Johnson. But with an agonizingly small majority, the posture of the GOP conference will play a significant role in that choice.
Johnson will face pressure from his right flank to impeach Biden while centrists, Republicans in battleground districts and even some old-school pragmatists may want a proverbial smoking gun if they are going to take the vote.
Despite the tumult of the last four years, impeachments are exceedingly rare. And none have taken more than a few months between the start of an inquiry and a vote to actually remove a president.
Two of American history's four impeachments have taken the House about three months from the announcement of an inquiry to a vote on the House floor:
The other two impeachments moved quickly. That includes the second time the House tried to remove Trump from office, which was nearly immediate. Though the chamber flirted repeatedly with moving to boot former President Andrew Johnson back in 1868 the final vote happened swiftly.
The Biden probe is on track to take a bit longer. For months, vulnerable Republicans fought against formalizing the impeachment inquiry, and the House GOP also spent three weeks trying to replace Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) as speaker. Key investigators say they’re aiming to decide whether to draft articles of impeachment as soon as mid-January.
This week's vote entirely along party lines by the Republican-controlled House of Representatives to formally launch an impeachment inquiry into President Biden immediately impacted the president's 2024 re-election campaign.
A fundraising email sent hours later by Vice President Kamala Harris instantly caught fire.
A source familiar with the Biden re-election team's thinking told Fox News that the email was the most lucrative that has been sent so far this month.
"It was the best performing fundraising email the vice president has signed this cycle," the source added.
HOUSE VOTES TO AUTHORIZE BIDEN IMPEACHMENT INQUIRY
The impeachment vote formalized an inquiry that began in September to investigate whether the president financially benefited from some of his family's business dealings.
POLL: SUPPORT FOR BIDEN IMPEACHMENT INQUIRY GROWS
Three Republican-led House committees are looking into connections between the president and his son Hunter Biden's business dealings from 2014-2017, during the elder Biden's final three years as vice president, and after he left office.
Hunter Biden reiterated this week that his father was not involved in his dealings as a board member of Ukrainian energy company Burisma, or in his partnership with a Chinese private businessman.
Republican investigators have so far not found any solid evidence that Biden personally benefited, but they argue there's more to uncover.
While the vote to formalize the inquiry is apparently boosting Biden's 2024 re-election fundraising, it may also pay dividends in other ways.
It could energize the base of a party that polls suggest is anything but energized by the president's re-election drive.
The Biden campaign launched a blistering broadside against House Republicans early this week, ahead of Wednesday's vote, accusing them of doing the bidding of Biden's likely GOP challenger next November - former President Donald Trump, the commanding front-runner for the 2024 Republican nomination.
"The only, single fact in this entire sham impeachment exercise is that it’s a nakedly transparent ploy by House MAGA Republicans to boost Donald Trump’s presidential campaign," Biden campaign communications director Michael Tyler charged in a memo.
The memo spotlights a quote that went viral from Republican Rep. Troy Nehls of Texas, who said the impeachment inquiry would give the former president "a little bit of ammo to fire back."
But the impeachment inquiry also provides plenty of downsides for Biden's re-election effort.
Republicans for years have viewed Hunter Biden's controversies as a political liability for his father. And now, a formal impeachment investigation - with public hearings - could give the Biden campaign lots of headaches.
"It keeps the negative story about his family in the news," longtime Republican strategist and communicator Ryan Williams told Fox News. "The impeachment inquiry highlights potential wrongdoing on the part of the president’s son and brother and tries to link it directly to him."
Republicans can also leverage the impeachment proceedings - as well as Hunter Biden's legal cases - to deflect attention away from Trump's extremely serious court cases.
Trump made history earlier this year as the first former or current president to be indicted for a crime, but his four indictments — including in federal court in Washington, D.C., and in Fulton County court in Georgia — on charges he tried to overturn his 2020 presidential election loss.
"It tries to distract from the serious legal issues Trump is facing and basically at the end of the day," said Ryan, a veteran of multiple GOP presidential campaigns.
He emphasized that inquiry "shows voters both candidates are facing investigations. It muddies the waters. It tries to make things murky even though the criminal trials that President Trump is facing are much different than the Republican-led inquiry in the House."
Rep. Dean Phillips of Minnesota, who's running a long-shot Democratic primary challenge against the president, made a similar argument.
"I don’t see the evidence of it, but yes, when your own son and your own brother are clearly, at the very least unethical and at worst, doing illegal things — my goodness, of course the country pays attention to it," Phillips said in an interview with the news website Semafor. "People do believe that it perhaps makes him unelectable — somehow, it conflates him with the Trump family’s indiscretions."
But Democratic strategist Chris Moyer, who served on a handful of presidential campaigns, disagreed.
"No one is Donald Trump when it comes to corruption, breaking the law, and violating his oath of office," he argued, when asked if the inquiry lessens the sting of Trump’s own legal controversies.
Biden became the second straight president to face an impeachment inquiry as his re-election was underway, following Trump.
Veteran political scientist Wayne Lesperance spotlighted that "perhaps the biggest casualty of the recent vote is the impeachment process itself. Long gone are the days when impeachment was a last resort for members of Congress who have exhausted all other options of holding the President accountable."
Lesperance, the president of New Hampshire-based New England College, said that "the frequency with which impeachment has occurred in recent years has reduced the process to yet another partisan tool for whichever party is in power. The real loser in these processes has become the American people, who continue to lose faith in their beleaguered system of government."
Detractors refer to Washington, D.C., as "the swamp."
But this is about another swamp – specifically, the Senate "swamp."
The Senate swamp is a geographic location on Capitol Hill. It’s just across from the Senate steps and where some Senate officials park their cars. Those who work and operate on Capitol Hill have referred to this spot as the Senate swamp for decades.
They started calling the locale the Senate swamp in 1964.
Legendary congressional correspondent Roger Mudd covered the filibuster of the Civil Rights Act for CBS. Mudd often did his TV standups from the Senate steps with a large clock behind him to show how much time had elapsed (eventually two months) during the filibuster.
Southern senators complained about Mudd standing on the Senate steps. The U.S. Capitol Police moved Mudd and his compadres in the press corps across the plaza to a grassy area. Well, one day it rained. And the correspondent was named "Mudd." So, they started referring to the area as the "Senate swamp."
However, that site is anything but a swamp.
The area is paved. A panel of permanent, stainless steel TV jacks for networks to do live shots lines a narrow concrete façade. Reporters can face one direction and talk about Congress with the Capitol behind them. If reporters turn around, they can talk about legal opinions with the Supreme Court serving as a backdrop.
Or, someone like Hunter Biden can use the spot for a press conference, as he did Wednesday morning, publicly defying a House subpoena for a closed-door deposition.
The entrance to the Rayburn House Office Building is more than an eighth of a mile from the Senate swamp. A phalanx of reporters and photographers swarmed the halls of Rayburn, awaiting Hunter Biden’s anticipated arrival for a closed-door deposition. Another horde of journalists roamed the Rayburn "horseshoe," a semi-circular driveway which curves up to a side entrance across from the Longworth House Office Building.
No one was 100% sure whether Hunter Biden would show up.
House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., issued a subpoena for Hunter Biden to "testify at a deposition touching matters of inquiry," at 9:30 a.m. ET on Wednesday in the Rayburn Building. The subpoena added that "you are not to depart without leave of said committee or subcommittee."
HOUSE VOTES TO AUTHORIZE IMPEACHMENT INQUIRY
In late November, Abbe Lowell — who is Hunter Biden’s attorney — countered Comer’s demand for a deposition with a demand of his own.
"We have seen you use closed-door sessions to manipulate, even distort the facts and misinform the public," wrote Lowell to Comer. "We therefore propose opening the door."
The ultimatum appeared to catch Comer and Republicans on the Oversight Committee off guard. Comer said he would grant Hunter Biden the chance to testify at an open hearing, but a closed-door deposition must come first. Comer cited how Democrats conducted multiple, private depositions in their impeachment investigation of former President Trump in the fall of 2019, ahead of public hearings a couple of months later.
So, Hunter Biden indeed showed up on Capitol Hill around 9:30 am Wednesday — but not anywhere near the Rayburn House Office Building.
Hunter Biden materialized an eighth of a mile away at the Senate swamp — that same locale where the Capitol Police banished Roger Mudd to report on the Civil Rights Act filibuster.
Hunter Biden’s Senate swamp maneuver was a filibuster unto itself when it came to ignoring James Comer’s subpoena. But his appearance was both political stagecraft and legal scheme bundled into one.
Hunter Biden showed up on Capitol Hill at the assigned time. But he wasn’t going anywhere close to the room where Comer planned a multi-hour deposition. Materializing at the Senate swamp site with the Capitol dome glimmering behind him was an effort by Hunter Biden to demonstrate he was willing to appear — just on his terms.
ANDY BIGGS CALLS FOR CONTEMPT CHARGES AGAINST ERIC SWALWELL FOR AIDING HUNTER BIDEN
After a brief statement, Hunter Biden left the Senate swamp site, climbed into a van and departed.
Reporters and scribes were panting. Out of breath. Bent over. Hands holding their legs just above their knees like a gassed NBA shooting guard in the fourth quarter. They received word that Hunter Biden was coming to Capitol Hill. But most were over in the Rayburn House Office Building — nowhere near the spot where the news of the day unfolded.
So how and why did the Senate swamp become the hot venue for the story of the day?
It starts with Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif.
Lawmakers are permitted to use the Senate swamp site and a similar location called the "House triangle" for press conferences and other events. The same with studios in the House and Senate Radio/TV Galleries inside the Capitol complex. However, the indoor locations generally require rank-and-file members to secure an invitation from a credentialed member of the congressional press corps.
It’s rare, but not unprecedented, for a House member to book an event on the Senate side. The same with a senator on the House side.
So Swalwell reserved the Senate swamp for a vague press event on Wednesday morning at 9:30. Only Swalwell had no intention of speaking to the press. This was Hunter Biden’s forum.
Those are the logistics.
But that doesn’t tell the full story.
There’s a reason why Hunter Biden showed up on the Senate side of Capitol Hill and not the House side.
Let’s say Hunter Biden ventured into the sea of reporters awaiting his prospective arrival at the Rayburn House Office Building, had his say and left. Or imagine if he had even done the same at the House triangle. The president’s son was already out of compliance with Comer’s subpoena by not attending the deposition. But showing up anywhere on the House side of the Capitol could have triggered a host of legal, constitutional and parliamentary issues for him.
JOE BIDEN FRUSTRATED AND ANXIOUS ABOUT HUNTER, SNAPS AT AIDES WHEN ASKED ABOUT INVESTIGATION: REPORT
You see, the House Sergeant at Arms has jurisdiction over the House side of the Capitol. Yes. The House and Senate meet in the same building. But constitutionally, they are distinct institutions. It’s conceivable that Comer could have argued to the Sergeant at Arms or the Capitol Police that his witness flaunted a subpoena if he showed up on House grounds — yet failed to testify.
It’s unlikely that congressional security officials truly would have done anything about it had Comer — or more specifically, House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., demanded action for a witness defying a subpoena. The House does hold certain "inherent" enforcement powers when it comes to contempt of Congress. Congress used to arrest and hold people for contempt of Congress in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. The last such action where Congress exercised its "inherent" contempt powers was with a Department of Commerce official in the 1930s.
But Abbe Lowell is no fool.
He knew that his client could earn the media attention he wanted by coming to Capitol Hill at the precise time dictated by the subpoena — yet not setting foot anywhere near the House of Representatives. Hence, the Senate swamp.
And being on the Senate side provided something of a legal shield to inoculate Hunter Biden, which he would not have enjoyed on House turf.
Yes, Hunter Biden defied a subpoena and failed to appear for a deposition. It’s possible the House will vote to hold President Biden’s son in contempt of Congress. Such a referral could go to the Department of Justice for potential prosecution.
But in resisting the subpoena, Hunter Biden showed up at the Senate swamp.
It may be a swamp. But in this case, the terra firma of the Senate offered firmer legal footing to Hunter Biden than the marble floors of the Rayburn House Office Building.