Trump refuses to promise not to abuse power, says he will be a dictator ‘on day one’

Posted on by Mark Sumner

During an interview on Tuesday evening, Fox News’ Sean Hannity asked Donald Trump whether he would abuse power if he was returned to office and noted that Trump has been using the line “I am your retribution” in his campaign. Trump responded by praising Al Capone, who he called “one of the greatest of all time, if you like criminals” while failing to promise that he wouldn’t abuse power.

Hannity then tried again, asking Trump to promise the public that he wouldn’t abuse power as retribution against anybody. For a second time, Trump refused to make that promise. “Except for day one,” he replied. Trump followed this by saying, “I want to close the border and drill, drill, drill.” Trump then acknowledges that Hannity wants him to say he’s not going to be a dictator before repeating that he will be a dictator “on day one.”

Hannity tries to save this by insisting that what Trump is saying doesn’t sound like retribution and is just Trump returning to the policies of his first term. But Trump never makes the promise not to abuse power or not to violate the law to persecute those he sees as enemies.

Hannity asks Trump if he has plans to become a dictator. Notably, Trump immediately changes the topic and doesn't answer the question. pic.twitter.com/47dDLSw69X

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) December 6, 2023

The Biden-Harris campaign responded to Trump’s words with a brief statement.

NEW >> statement on Trump's townhall tonight from Biden-Harris Campaign Manager @JulieR2022 “Donald Trump has been telling us exactly what he will do if he’s reelected and tonight he said he will be a dictator on day one. Americans should believe him.” pic.twitter.com/nBMB0suJlW

— Ammar Moussa (@ammarmufasa) December 6, 2023

This is not the first time Trump has made such a statement. At an earlier stop in Iowa, Trump declared that he had been “waging an all-out war on American democracy.” Though that particular phrase may have been a Freudian slip, over the last few weeks even media outlets that have been willing to sleepwalk past Trump’s comments have started to wake up to the open threats of authoritarian rule.

It was the great poet Maya Angelou who said, “When someone tells you who they are, believe them.” No one may have generated more reiterations of that truth than Trump.

Trump has been telling us who he is from well before he came down the golden escalator at the start of his 2016 campaign. His pro-authoritarian leanings were visible in a 1990 interview with Playboy, where Trump expressed his admiration for how the Chinese government had crushed students at Tiananmen Square the year before. Trump called those peaceful pro-democracy protests a riot and praised the communist leaders for the “strength” they showed in killing hundreds or thousands to protect their own power.

Trump has declared himself a “big fan” of Turkish strongman Recep Erdoğan. Hungarian extremist Viktor Orban has become a regular feature of Trump’s rally speeches (even if Trump sometimes can’t remember what country Orban leads). Trump’s timid primary opponents were disturbed enough by his praise for brutal North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un to momentarily express their concerns. Trump has heaped praise on the “brilliant” Chinese dictator Xi Jinping. And Trump is always willing to express his admiration for Russian warlord and enemy of democracy Vladimir Putin.

These are the leaders Trump looks to as his role models. He believes their ability to do whatever they please makes them strong. He thinks their outsized egos and narcissism make them great. He’s not just telling us who he admires, he’s also telling us who he is.

If America goes down the road to dictatorship with Trump, there are no do-overs. Authoritarian rule is not something the nation can sample, just to see if it likes the taste. Once a dictatorship is in place, it will do whatever it takes to remain there … from day one.

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Trump again threatens the media. Will the media care?

Posted on by Mark Sumner

In an infamous article from 1922, The New York Times introduced the United States to a rising German politician by insisting that "Hitler's anti-Semitism was not so violent or genuine as it sounded." It would be nice to think that in the intervening century the nation’s largest media outlets have learned a lesson. And they have. They’ve learned to lean into it.

As Daily Kos’ Laura Clawson reported on Tuesday, a new study shows that the media is willing to cut Donald Trump infinite slack when it comes to using dehumanizing and threatening language toward everyone he sees as an opponent. Which is … everyone. Democrats. Republicans. Former members of his staff. Judges. The whole legal system. Steve Jobs’ widow.

But no one seems as eager to indulge Trump as America’s leading news outlets. It’s not just that they’re willing to look the other way when he attacks others; they are also eternally willing to bend over and take another one for team “objective journalism.” Except what they’re promoting isn’t anything like fairness, and what they’re protecting certainly isn’t some platonic ideal of truth.  

The nation’s major media outlets are begging Trump to hurt them again. Hurt them good. Oh, and to destroy the nation while he’s at it.

Overnight, Trump attacked MSNBC. The reason for this isn’t particularly clear and doesn’t particularly matter. However, in this attack, Trump makes an overt threat against the network, its leader, and the whole concept of the First Amendment.

In response to Trump’s attack, NBC News has issued this heartfelt reply: silence. But then, why wouldn’t they? They also didn’t comment back in September, when Trump threatened NBC’s parent company and insisted they should be investigated for “Country Threatening Treason.”

Silence in response to Trump’s threats is what major media outlets do.

Trump already declared the free press “the enemy of the people.” He already put journalists in cages so that his supporters could jeer them as Trump pointed them out for mockery. He didn’t do these things in the early days of his 2016 campaign. He did them while occupying the White House. Trump stood behind the bully pulpit and regularly informed the American public that the media was their enemy.

Those journalists were in a cage for a rally that Trump held in 2018, far from any presidential election. That the link to that Iowa rally is from an Australian news outlet is not a coincidence, as the reporter from that outlet seems to be the only one who was shocked by the way journalists were being pointed out for threats and derision, or by how an undercover filmmaker approached the cage to whisper that he was too afraid to try and conduct interviews, or how they weren’t even allowed to go to the bathroom without being supervised by a member of Trump’s staff. By that point, American journalists following Trump seemed to have simply accepted this as their lot.

Just over a month ago, Trump threatened journalists with prison rape unless they gave up sources who were informing on Trump’s crimes. And those same journalists went back to work the next day, cutting Trump every possible break.

The biggest of those breaks is simply this: Acting as if because Trump espouses fascism, racism, misogyny, bigotry, and violence every day, it’s not news. This is the most ass-backward idea ever cooked up in a newsroom. The fact that Trump does it over, and over, and over is the news. Responsible, objective journalism isn’t ignoring Trump’s threats because he makes them regularly. The regularity of his vile statements makes them both worse and more newsworthy.

If the mass media treated the Son of Sam killings the way they do Donald Trump, they would have stopped reporting after the first victim. After all, it’s just more of the same thing, right?

Trump is out there attacking journalists every day. He’s out there spitting on the First Amendment every day. He’s doubling down on his attacks on democracy every day. And all major media seems to think about is how many more clicks, views, and ad dollars they will make if they can use silence and selective reporting to ease Trump over the line to the White House.

Every time Trump calls out journalists or a media outlet, the reaction seems to be the same. Rather than fighting back, or defending their reporting, outlets slink further into the placating corner. Or hire another former Trump official. They seemed genuinely more concerned about offending Nazis than fighting them.

News outlets appear willing to keep up the pretense of being objective, even when studies show that they are leaning on the accelerator for Trump. They’ll keep up that pretense even in the face of the absolute reality that, should their boost carry Trump back to the Oval Office, he will come for them. He will come for the “enemies of the people.” He will come for those guilty of “country threatening treason.” He will make the days when he only put reporters in cages and encouraged the crowd to scream at them seem like a fond memory.

Trump is dedicated to destroying democracy. He’s absolutely insistent on ending the free press. He is openly using Nazi propaganda and threatening to repeat the most despicable events in history. Even so, as Laura wrote on Tuesday:

There is no question, by the hard numbers, that the media is giving Donald Trump a pass. His dehumanizing rhetoric describing his political opponents as “vermin” that he will “root out” is a nonstory as far as the broadcast networks, cable news networks, and largest newspapers in the country are concerned

Unless something changes, it will go on being a nonstory right up until the time Trump is telling them what stories are allowed.

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Hunter Biden offers to testify. Republicans scurry away in fear

Posted on by Mark Sumner

After months of being treated as a punching bag by Republicans in the House and by right-wing media, Hunter Biden has reacted to a Republican subpoena by offering to testify in person before the House Oversight Committee that’s supposedly looking into allegations of misconduct by President Joe Biden and members of his family. It’s a direct challenge to Republican committee Chair James Comer and to the GOP’s ongoing efforts to create an excuse to impeach the president.

Hunter Biden’s testimony could be one of the greatest “put up or shut up” moments of the century.

Except it’s not going to happen. It’s not happening because the offer to testify in public and answer any question that Republicans wanted to ask was met with a refusal from Comer. The last thing the House Oversight chair wants in his committee is the truth.

According to Hunter’s attorney, David Lowell, the president’s son is willing to sit for the committee on “December 13, or any date in December that we can arrange.” And he has just one requirement: That testimony has to be public, so everyone gets to hear what Republicans ask and what Hunter has to say in response. “All you will learn is that your accusations are baseless,” writes Lowell. “However, the American people should see that for themselves.”

That’s exactly what terrifies Comer. As CNN reports, the Republican congressman who has been making outrageous claims about the Biden family for months quickly rejected the idea of public testimony. “Hunter Biden is trying to play by his own rules instead of following the rules required of everyone else,” said Comer. “That won’t stand with House Republicans.”

Instead, Comer insists that Hunter must appear before Republicans in private so that they can frame information released about both questions and answers in the way they best suits their “investigation.” Republican Rep. Ben Cline followed Comer’s refusal by maintaining that Hunter’s offer to testify in public was part of a Democratic scheme to block Comer’s investigation.

Because, as everyone knows, open public testimony is something that a Republican investigation simply cannot tolerate.

Hunter has been the subject of continuous attacks since Rudy Giuliani first strolled into The New York Times in 2019 and handed them an utterly ridiculous story about Hunter, his father, and a corrupt prosecutor in Ukraine. That story was rapidly and thoroughly debunked, but that hasn’t kept Republicans from citing it as fact from that day until the present. Just days before the 2020 election, Giuliani announced that he had obtained “Hunter Biden’s laptop”—a phrase that has now been promoted thousands of times by Donald Trump, Republicans in the House and Senate, right-wing media, and Elon Musk. Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene went so far as to brandish revenge porn taken from this nonexistent laptop on the floor of the House.

The combined effort of Republicans, their supporters, and the media to crush Hunter may be the most jaw-dropping example of the lengths to which the right will go in an effort to find some reason, any reason, to defame Joe Biden. In the past few weeks, Comer has been dribbling out already well-established information one crumb at a time, treating each piece as if it’s some kind of revelation and throwing claims of corruption at multiple members of the Biden family.

And that’s exactly what Comer and others intend to do over the coming months. They have no interest in the truth, and no interest in what Hunter Biden has to say. They only want to preserve their ability to pretend to “investigate” by way of smear.

Rep. Jamie Raskin issued a response to Comer’s insistence that his work can only be carried out in darkness:

“Let me get this straight.  After wailing and moaning for ten months about Hunter Biden and alluding to some vast unproven family conspiracy, after sending Hunter Biden a subpoena to appear and testify, Chairman Comer and the Oversight Republicans now reject his offer to appear before the full Committee and the eyes of the world and to answer any questions that they pose?  What an epic humiliation for our colleagues and what a frank confession that they are simply not interested in the facts and have no confidence in their own case or the ability of their own Members to pursue it.  After the miserable failure of their impeachment hearing in September, Chairman Comer has now apparently decided to avoid all Committee hearings where the public can actually see for itself the logical, rhetorical and factual contortions they have tied themselves up in.  The evidence has shown time and again President Biden has committed no wrongdoing, much less an impeachable offense.  Chairman Comer’s insistence that Hunter Biden’s interview should happen behind closed doors proves it once again.  What the Republicans fear most is sunlight and the truth.”

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Rep. James Comer’s family business is shadier than anything involving Joe Biden

Posted on by Mark Sumner

In the last two weeks, Rep. James Comer has claimed that President Joe Biden “laundered China money,” accused Biden of “influence peddling,” and issued subpoenas to members of Biden’s family. Comer has based these actions on the “discovery” of transactions that Biden made no effort to disguise, including a $200,000 loan Biden extended to his brother and which his brother later repaid.

However, as The Daily Beast reports, Comer was engaged in a series of business dealings with his own brother. Those dealings, which included a $200,000 payment, were nowhere near as straightforward as the dealings between Joe and James Biden. Comer’s deal involved not only a big payment but multiple land swamps, shell companies, and requests for special tax breaks.

As members of the Biden family were being accused of “shady business practices,” it seems that Comer has a forest's worth of shade.

In a press release about the check from Biden’s brother, Comer stated, “Even if this was a personal loan repayment, it’s still troubling that Joe Biden’s ability to be paid back by his brother depended on the success of his family’s shady financial dealings.” By this, Comer seems to mean that Biden was repaid soon after his brother received a payment from an American health care company.

But what happened between Comer and his brother is a lot more mysterious. According to The Daily Beast, Comer’s family has for years been identified in news accounts as owning “Comer Land & Cattle.” As of 2018, Comer listed this as an asset worth $3 million.

However, no such entity appears to exist in business filings. It reportedly did at one time, but there’s been no such business for years. At least, not legally. It’s not registered as a business in Kentucky. It’s not registered anywhere else. A past press release showed him as the owner of “James Comer Jr. Farms,” which also doesn’t appear on paper to be a business entity. Comer’s Facebook page also lists him as the owner of “Comer Family Farms,” which isn’t listed as a business entity in Kentucky, according to the secretary of state’s website.

Much of Comer’s business activity seems to follow inheriting land in Kentucky following his father’s death in 2019. But exactly what happened with that land is the opposite of transparent. In one case, Comer reportedly sold his interest in a piece of land to his brother, then bought it back five months later, slipping his brother $18,000 in the process. That purchase ran through a shell company owned by Comer, the value of which doubled in two years. That company appears to have dealt exclusively with agricultural land deals at a time when Comer was on the House Agriculture Committee.

Comer’s family also swapped large tracts of land in Tennessee. That includes handing his brother one tract valued at $175,000 as a “gift.” In exchange, Comer reportedly got another tract that The Daily Beast describes as “apparently more valuable” without recording the cost of that land. The value of these transactions appears to be larger than even the largest loan that Biden gave to his brother.

Comer also seems to have benefited directly from a “tobacco buyout” of land he purchased while serving on the Kentucky legislature’s Tobacco Settlement Agreement Fund Oversight Committee. This means that he helped set the rate for the purchase of his own property.

Much of Comer’s story seems to be a more rural version of the Donald Trump story. He started out making small land purchases with the help of his father and brother, inherited larger tracts of land when his father died, and has made millions engaging in land speculation. The difference is that for much of this time, Comer was either involved in the Kentucky legislature or the House Agriculture Committee in positions that gave him insider knowledge and a direct advantage.

Comer also has his own Trump-style bank connection. When he sought a line of credit up to $1 million, he found it at South Central Bank—the same bank where Comer had been on the board of directors for 12 years.

If all of this makes Comer look like a country mini-Trump, that’s probably a description that would make him proud. But it would also seem to make his family finances much more worthy of scrutiny than anything he’s claimed about Joe Biden.

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The band is back together, and it is a glorious day as Markos and Kerry’s hot takes over the past year came true—again! Republicans continue to lose at the ballot box and we are here for it!

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Details of Trump’s alleged money-for-secrets deal are revealed

Posted on by Mark Sumner

On Monday morning, Donald Trump called Australian billionaire and Mar-a-Lago member Anthony Pratt a “red haired weirdo” and declared that he never spoke to Pratt about submarines. That one-two punch of strangeness follows strong evidence that Trump did exactly what he’s saying he never did: shared sensitive information about American nuclear submarines with Pratt. That information has since been spread widely among foreign officials, possibly weakening America’s nuclear defense.

Now there’s a growing impression that not only did Trump provide Pratt with inside information on some of the most critical military secrets, Trump did so in response to the “red haired weirdo” opening up his extremely chunky wallet to slide money Trump’s way. That includes offering what amounted to an unlimited campaign contribution laundered through the Mar-a-Lago resort.

Trump is trying to distance himself from Pratt because the evidence of his wrongdoing with the Australian billionaire seems clear. But even as Trump’s squirming to get away from one crime, he may have committed another.

Anthony Pratt is one of the wealthiest men in Australia. Wherever you live in the world, there’s a fair chance that some of his products are in your home right now. That’s because what Pratt makes is primarily packing materials, and in this online-order/home-delivery world, he’s doing very well. Pratt and his family are worth an estimated $24 billion. That’s up by $5 billion in just the last three pandemic-centric years.  

After Trump won the 2016 election, Pratt invested heavily in his relationship with Donald Trump. He purchased a membership at Mar-a-Lago, bought high-cost tickets to spend holidays with Trump, and offered to provide an undefined level of funding for Trump’s reelection by renting an unlimited number of hotel rooms at Trump’s resort. Even after Trump lost the 2020 election, he and Pratt seemed to remain close, meeting at Mar-a-Lago and having lengthy conversations.

That Pratt would think it worth almost any level of investment to keep Trump in office makes sense. For a billionaire whose primary business is paper mills, the guy who blows most of the budget on tax cuts for the wealthy and who is devoted to destroying environmental regulations might just be the ideal leader. That Trump also so mismanaged a deadly pandemic that he helped accelerate the transition from in-person to online shopping is just a bonus.

But the thing that Trump and Pratt discussed that’s now the red-hot focus of special counsel Jack Smith isn’t whatever Trump may have promised Pratt about the Clean Water Act or undercutting health care. It’s submarines.

On Oct. 5, ABC News broke the story that Pratt had been interviewed by members of Smith’s team “at least twice” regarding conversations that he and Trump had concerning potentially classified information about the capabilities of American submarines. Pratt then went on to share what he had learned from Trump with “scores of others, including more than a dozen foreign officials.”

Among the information Trump is believed to have disclosed to Pratt are the exact number of nuclear warheads U.S. subs routinely carry, and how closely they can operate to Russian subs without being detected. Both pieces of information are critical in defining the capabilities of the U.S. submarine fleet.

If Trump was accurate in relaying the information to Pratt, and Pratt repeated it to the “scores” of people he claims, it represents what could be an unprecedented unmasking of America’s most secretive power. This leak could seriously affect how the U.S. operates on both a tactical and strategic level. There are few pieces of military information that have—or at least had—more value.

The New York Times story that Trump mentioned in his social media post ran on Sunday evening. It not only repeated the allegations of the earlier ABC News account but also expanded on them by showing how Pratt had kept money flowing to Trump’s campaign. That included offering to “book as many rooms as available” for any campaign event Trump wanted to hold at Mar-a-Lago.

On another occasion, Pratt gave Trump $1 million for tickets to a New Year’s Eve event at Mar-a-Lago even though the actual price of those tickets was “$50,000 or less.” That certainly looks as if Pratt simply stuffed $1 million into Trump’s pocket—a contribution that’s unlikely to have appeared on Trump’s campaign finance reports.

If what Pratt was after was access, he got it. Trump gave Pratt a seat in his motorcade, invited him to a state dinner, and toured one of his plants in Ohio. And in a series of recordings obtained by “60 Minutes Australia,” Pratt revealed that Trump talked about far more than submarines.

YouTube Video

According to Pratt, Trump also told him about his private phone conversations with Iraqi leaders following a U.S. missile strike. At a point when the strike had not even become public knowledge, Trump was happy to share how he had bullied Iraq’s then-President Barham Salih.

“I just bombed Iraq today,” Trump reportedly told Pratt. “And the president of Iraq called me up and said, ‘You just leveled my city.’ And I said to him, ‘Okay, what are you going to do about it?’”

Trump also talked to Pratt about the infamous call in which he attempted to blackmail Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. That call led to Trump’s first impeachment, but Trump dismissed his actions as trivial. “You know that Ukraine phone call?” he reportedly told Pratt. “That was nothing compared to what I usually do. That Ukraine phone call was nothing compared to what we usually talk about.” Which certainly raises questions about just how often Trump used his private phone calls with foreign leaders to extract personal favors.

Just to add a profound dollop of disgust on top of the flow of secrets, Pratt also says that Trump told his wife, Melania Trump, to strut around Mar-a-Lago in a bikini “so all the other guys could get a look at what they were missing.”

As has happened with so many others, Pratt notes how Trump operates “like the Mafia,” and likes to make statements that skate around the law. “He’s outrageous,” Pratt said of Trump. “He just says whatever the f*ck he wants. And he loves to shock people.”

Pratt repeatedly demonstrated his admiration for how Trump “... knows exactly what to say and what not to say so he avoids jail.” But that’s one place where Pratt was hopefully wrong. Trump seems to think so. That’s why his former pal has become a “red haired weirdo.”

Trump never hesitates to jettison anyone at any time when he thinks they’ve become a liability. He clearly feels that way about Pratt. However, it certainly seems this is another occasion when Trump has burned his bridges way, way too late to help.

And in the process of all this, there’s the strong possibility that Trump’s attack on Pratt violates a standing gag order already in place on the classified documents case. That’s because Pratt is on the list of witnesses, and Trump’s statements could easily be read as an attempt to influence Pratt’s testimony.

As the “60 Minutes Australia” piece says at the opening, Trump is in “a mess.” And he’s still making it messier.

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Jim Jordan is a proxy for Donald Trump—and so is his failure

Posted on by Mark Sumner

As the House heads into another day without a speaker, multiple GOP sources are indicating that Rep. Jim Jordan’s failures on Tuesday and Wednesday may be as close as he comes to the chair. As the endorsed candidate of Donald Trump, Jordan would be by far the most MAGA speaker to date, and he’s running the most MAGA campaign imaginable. That’s both his biggest asset and the biggest reason he’s losing.

Jordan is about nothing except showing how Trump’s faction controls Republicans in the House. On the face of it, that shouldn’t be a complete roadblock. After all, Trump still dominates the Republican Party, and even representatives in districts won by President Joe Biden might be expected to simply hand over their vote and stay quiet. But Jordan is Jordan. He was actively involved in Trump’s post-election schemes right up through Jan. 6, has a 16-year law-free record of using his seat in the House to spread conspiracy theories, and has not a single shred of evidence that he is in any way capable of being speaker.

But what might be weighing down Jordan’s bid most, beyond his own execrable nature, are the tactics he has utilized in an effort to gain votes. Republicans are finding that, nice as it may be to have Trump’s attack machine savaging Democrats, it’s a lot less fun when the weapon is pointed at their own faces.

According to CNN correspondent Manu Raju, Jordan is “bleeding” votes. If he makes another run at the office on Thursday, he may find the number of Republicans voting against him has grown to 30 or more. That widening dissatisfaction has raised doubts about whether Jordan will actually make another attempt at this time.

Much of the Trump apparatus of right-wing television, talk radio, and social media has been pushing hard for Jordan, and the resulting flood of screaming, cussing, and threatening phone calls and emails has sometimes had the desired effect. For example, Missouri Rep. Ann Wagner, who two days earlier declared she would “absolutely not” vote for Jordan, folded like a cheap suit.

However, as NBC News reports, Jordan’s “aggressive campaign” is also generating a backlash, which is stiffening the spines of some of those under attack. That includes Nebraska holdout Rep. Don Bacon, whose wife has reportedly been subjected to a flood of personal threats. It also includes Iowa Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks, who released a statement saying she had been subjected to “credible death threats” after voting against Jordan on Wednesday.

"One thing I cannot stomach, or support is a bully," Miller-Meeks wrote, "Someone who threatens another with bodily harm or tries to suppress differing opinions undermines opportunity for unity and regard for freedom of speech."

As with other Republicans, there doesn’t seem to be any statements from Miller-Meeks expressing her concern for Trump’s many instances of exactly this kind of bullying, which makes it seem like Republicans don’t really mind a bully. They just don’t enjoy being bullied. Statements like that from Trump adviser Stephen Miller trying to pass off the flood of threats as “organic” calls from constituents have only increased the distaste for the whole scheme.

Jordan’s bid may not be completely dead. CBS correspondent Robert Costa reports that “key” Republicans were seeking assurances from Jordan that he would walk back some of his past positions, including blocking funding for Ukraine. If Jordan were willing to accept a “weaker speakership,” he might be able to gain a few votes.

But if Jordan’s bid is not completely dead, it’s certainly moribund. Reviving it will take something more than a few vague assurances that he will not block a specific bill.

Since Republicans gained a narrow edge in the House, Jordan has devoted 100% of his time to repeating long-debunked conspiracy theories about Biden. That’s all Trump wants from him. Jordan’s 16-year record of authoring not a single law isn’t an accident, that’s his whole platform. He’s just there for the destruction.

There remain a small number of Republicans who have an agenda slightly bigger than repeating lies for Trump. An even larger number don’t appreciate being threatened into supporting a guy who comes with zero accomplishments and a still-looming scandal with a lot of unanswered questions.

Jordan’s run at the speakership has always been a test of whether Republicans in the House are more concerned about pleasing Trump than they are about having an effective speaker. Someone who is less of a blunt object might have carried that across the line easily enough. But that someone wouldn’t be Jim Jordan.

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The 5 best moments of the House ‘impeachment inquiry’ farce

Posted on by Mark Sumner

The impeachment inquiry that Republicans started on Thursday was demonstrably without merit and initiated in violation of House rules and precedent. At the end of the day, after hearing from three Republican non-fact witnesses chosen because of their commentary in right-wing media, not a single hint of evidence was produced to justify the inquiry.

Even so, the hearing was extremely revealing—only that most of what it revealed was how ready Republicans were to manufacture false claims and wheel out conspiracy theories that have been widely debunked for years. This was partly because they had nothing else. Mostly, it was because every single Republican treated their five minutes of camera time as if they were doing a one-person play for Newsmax.

Through the course of the day, not only did Republicans showcase their lack of interest in facts, they also demonstrated that they are absolutely terrified of anything that looks like a fact witness.

Here are five highlights showing that the all-day event definitely had value.

5. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez calls out manufactured images

During his five minutes, Republican Rep. Byron Donalds trotted out a series of images that were reportedly messages from Hunter Biden. They appeared to be screenshots of phone messages, complete with little green bubbles. However, these images, many of which came straight out of sites associated with QAnon, were neither actual screenshots nor at all accurate.

It fell to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to call out one of the worst.

AOC: That screenshot of what appeared to be a text message was a fabricated image. It was a fabricated image, I don't know where it came from, I don't know if it was staff of the committee, pic.twitter.com/Hv6s9oii3a

— Acyn (@Acyn) September 28, 2023

In the actual message, Hunter Biden is worried about his ability to pay his alimony and is planning how he can get his life back together as he recovers from both drug addiction and a divorce, while hoping to find a way to pay back what he owes to members of his family. A friend replies offering Hunter a place to stay and help in planning his next steps.

But Donalds showed scraps of this conversation pasted together, which were meant to make it seem as if one of Hunter’s business partners was scheming to make a payment to President Joe Biden. It was about as close to the actual message as a ransom note generated though cutting words out of magazines.

And you can see exactly how concerned Donalds was about being caught committing absolute fraud.

Byron Donalds and his smug face while AOC points out that his text message presentation was a fabricated image that omitted key context. Tells you all you need to know about Byron Donalds. pic.twitter.com/t7xdn95TQk

— John G (@JohnnyG0626) September 28, 2023

Why wasn’t he concerned? As Ocasio-Cortez pointed out, everyone in the room other than the witnesses were protected by the “speech and debate clause” of the Constitution. That allows members of Congress to lie with impunity, and Republicans put that ability into heavy rotation during this hearing.

4. Rep. Jamie Raskin shows that Republicans are allergic to facts

Throughout the day, Republicans returned again and again to one claim: While serving as vice president, Joe Biden pressured Ukraine to dismiss prosecutor Viktor Shokin to protect the company Burisma, where Hunter Biden was on the board. That claim wasn’t simply an item on a list, it was the only claim that many of the Republican members talked about. That includes Rep. Jim Jordan, who used it both as his opening and in his sweaty, ranty closing remarks.

The problem with this claim is that it’s simply a lie. It’s a lie that was debunked literally within two weeks of when it first appeared, in 2019. The story did not exist before Giuliani brought it to The New York Times. It was immediately shot down. It was the basis of the phone call that Donald Trump placed to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in an attempt to blackmail him into producing false claims about Joe Biden. It has been debunked by everyone involved in every way possible.

Now Republicans are wedded to this baseless lie as the heart of their “inquiry.” That leaves them fighting desperately to prevent any facts about these events from entering the hearing room. That even extends to preventing Republican witnesses from appearing.

Rep. Jamie Raskin just moved the House GOP's Impeachment Inquiry to subpoena Rudy Giuliani and @levparnas for direct eye-witness testimony about their main allegations against President Joe Biden. Republicans just voted 20-19 to TABLE THE MOTION, keeping the key witnesses away! pic.twitter.com/cuNTFQjBLJ

— Grant Stern  (@grantstern) September 28, 2023

The biggest chuckle of the whole thing is how Jordan tries to pretend that somehow the Burisma lie can exist independent of Giuliani when everyone involved confirms that the story did not even exist until Giuliani began shopping it around in 2019. Everything that they are leaning on now, including that infamous FBI form 1023, was created in an effort to prop up Giuliani’s massive lie.

3. Rep. Robert Garcia shows what actual corruption looks like

Over and over throughout the day, it became obvious that there was one name missing from the “evidence” that Republicans kept repeating: the name of the guy they were supposedly investigating, Joe Biden. Republicans showed charts of an array of businesses. They went through stacks of phone texts and emails. They detailed meals almost down to the menu. But what was missing from 99.9% of the things they brought up was any whiff of the president.

Here’s Jordan’s tweet from last week that practically represents a summary of the hearing.

-The Biden “brand.” -10% for the Big Guy -50% of earnings -Shakedowns -Fake Names -Shell companies -Multiple family members getting paid -Multiple times the White House changed their story -Dinners -Meetings But according to Democrats, no need for an impeachment inquiry.

— Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) September 13, 2023

Unable to find anything that Joe Biden has done, Republicans declared that there was a Biden “brand” that they could then use as a proxy for Joe Biden. What does this mean? Were there license agreements? Biden water? Biden steaks? Maybe big gold letters spelling “BIDEN” above the doors of hotels actually owned by foreign corporations? None of that.

What the “Biden brand” and “the Biden family” really translates to is “We have nothing on Joe Biden.” But in case Republicans had forgotten what real corruption looked like, Rep. Robert Garcia came complete with pictures of someone who genuinely had worked in the White House, visited with foreign leaders on official business, then collected $2 billion from those leaders the day after Trump left office.

Rep. Garcia uses his time to highlight the brazen corruption embodied by the presence of Jared Kushner and Ivanka in the Trump White House pic.twitter.com/ZoutPuJ86d

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) September 28, 2023

2. Rep. Jasmine Crockett delivers one of many fantastic takedowns

The whole affair was such a shambles that as the day wore on, Democrats in the hearing were clearly having fun. Whether it was Raskin’s opening remarks that made it clear exactly what was going to happen, or Rep. Daniel Goldman repeatedly forcing a clearly exasperated Jordan to accept documents on the record following Republicans lying about those documents, there was a good deal of fun to be had from this pointless farce of a hearing.

Just watch Rep. Jared Moskowitz.

YouTube Video

Almost from the opening bell, things went so poorly for the Republicans that it was obvious why even Fox had relegated this thing to their business channel. Five years of investigating the same false claims had not brought them even a speck of evidence.

On any ordinary day, Moskowitz delivering the line, “As a former director of emergency management, I know a disaster when I see one,” would be a sure winner. But sorry, Rep. Moskowitz, that moment has to take second place to Rep. Jasmine Crockett’s remarks.

First, Crockett tried to enter a fact sheet into the record. When Jordan and Rep. James Comer objected, Crockett wasn’t even phased. “Of course y’all gonna object,” she said smoothly, “but we gon’ talk about it.” Then she moved on to a moment of absolute destruction.

Not only did Crockett absolutely slay Republicans over the idea that nothing they were talking about showed any connection to Joe Biden, but also she took the time to review some of the genuine threats raised by actions of Donald Trump. That included waving some of the images that were taken during the FBI search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort, where boxes of classified documents were stacked in a bathroom.

YouTube Video

Crockett: “When we start talking about things that look like evidence, they [Republicans] want to act like they’re blind. They don’t know what this is. These are our national secrets! Looks like in the shitter to me.”

1. Rep. Greg Casar blows apart the entire basis of the Republican ‘inquiry’

Throughout the day, in their hundreds of mentions of Hunter Biden, Republicans kept insisting that they were all about “equal treatment under the law,” and that Joe Biden’s son was getting off too lightly because of that “Biden brand.”

But when it came right down to it, Casar simply blew away that claim—as well as any claim that Republicans were concerned about justice at all—with one simple action.

Rep. Greg Casar (D-TX) asks House Oversight Committee members to raise their hands if they believe both Hunter Biden and Donald Trump should “be held accountable if they’re found guilty.” All Democrats raise their hands; no Republicans do. pic.twitter.com/NnPxjkGZyW

— The Recount (@therecount) September 28, 2023

Casar: “Will members of the Oversight Committee please raise your hand if you believe both Hunter and Trump should be held accountable for any of the indictments against them if convicted by a jury of their peers?”

Casar’s hand went up. The other Democrats on the committee raised their hands. Not one single Republican joined them.

In 30 seconds, Casar demonstrated absolutely that far from being about “equal justice,” Republicans are there to ensure unequal justice and to do the bidding of Donald Trump. It was a masterclass in simply calling on people to put up or shut up. And it should be an example that is not forgotten.

Sign and send the petition: NO to MAGA impeachment. Focus on what matters.

Live coverage: Republican impeachment inquiry (part 2)

Posted on by Mark Sumner
UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 7:19:19 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Rep. Rashida Tlaib contrasts the nonsense of this hearing with important hearings she’s been involved with in the past, and the damage done by a shut down—which Republicans are ignoring.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 7:16:47 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Democrats enter more documents into the record, some of it probably addressed what Gosar said. But I really can’t tell you what Gosar said.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 7:14:22 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Rep. Paul Gosar wins the award for being the worst at reading from his own notes. Honestly, Gosar is so monotone and is engaging in such a long string of … whatever, that even the most dedicated Republican Biden hater had to take this five minutes for a bathroom break. 

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 7:09:28 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Moskowitz is joining some previous Democrats in showing statements that Republicans have made in the past, but these are not the same statements just being repeated, but new statements from Comer, Grassley, et. al.

It’s a good job of reinforcing and building on the statements previously cited.

“They’re all one upping one another in the Donald Trump friend Olympics, trying to get invited to the sleepover at Mar-a-Lago.” — Rep. Jared Moskowitz

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 7:04:56 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Rep. Jared Moskowitz is thrilled with how this hearing is going “As a former director of emergency management, I know a disaster when I see one.”

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 7:03:23 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Greene waves around a picture of something. She says its a bathing suit. What it proves outside of Q-anon circles is unknown. 

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:59:39 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

And Greene is finally up. She is shocked, shocked, by how the DOJ hasn’t acted on claims she sent about unsupported claims that she sent about human trafficking by Hunter Biden. And because it was done in 2020, by the Trump DOJ, it was election interference. By Trump-appointed officials against Trump. 

If you thought Greene was going to say or ask anything reasonable … no, sorry. You never thought that. Apologies.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:54:02 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Quote of the day

Omg wow this pic.twitter.com/fnYcAXzcNf

— Acyn (@Acyn) September 28, 2023

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:53:06 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Goldman, who has been doing some heavy lifting on documents to this point, finally gets his opportunity to talk. He points out that the first hearing against Donald Trump had a full dozen fact witnesses, as opposed to zero.

And that, in addition to blocking an appearance by Giuliani, Republicans also won’t allow Devon Archer to testify, even though they are cherry picking his past statements as some of the primary evidence.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:51:15 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Joe Biden is 80. Every tax form he’s written since the Stone Age is public record. All his homes and bank accounts are on record. Do the Republicans think Biden is waiting until he’s 88 to retire and live it up on all the secret money?

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:50:02 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Rep. William Timmons says he’s going to “make it simple” for the American people by bringing it down to “What did Joe Biden know, and when.”

Now we’re down to “a Biden” as well “the Biden family.”

Now we’re in Kazakhstan. And Burisma. And the CCP. Because Hunter Biden is not only the smartest man in business, but able to predict the future actions of world leaders. Honestly, Hunter should be a billionaire if he was capable of half what the Republicans are accusing him of.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:44:45 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Crockett asks to enter into the record a fact sheet from Congressional Integrity Project, Comer and Jordan object. 

Crockett: “Of course y’all gonna object, but we gonna talk about it.” Crockett then proceeds to read a list of Trump activities in China that dwarf anything that Republicans have even tried to throw at Biden.

Crockett then goes to Gerhardt to see how many times Republicans have said “if” in regard to the claims against Biden. Gerhardt “has been keeping a tally.” The number is 35.

Crockett holds up a picture of classified documents being stored in the bathroom at Mar-a-Lago and delivers the quote of the day.

“These are our national secrets. Looks like in the shitter to me” 

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:37:37 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Rep. Jasmine Crockett points out that the form 1023 that Republicans keep citing has been “repeatedly debunked” including by the person who brought it to the FBI originally. The FBI investigated the claims and closed the investiation.

“Repeating the same lies will not turn them into truth. Kind of like the election that he lost.”

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:35:49 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Raskin says that Perry used an email that was “purportedly obtained from Hunter Biden’s laptop” which hasn’t be verified.

Raskin makes it clear that there is no chain of custody on this information. Jordan seems to think it’s okay because Hunter Biden is suing for breach of privacy. How that makes it okay unverified information, is left to the imagination.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:32:44 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Rep. Scott Perry wants to hold Hunter Biden guilty for simply being Joe Biden’s son. Perry once again demonstrates, after some slide fumbling, that Republicans either have so little to go on, or so uncoordinated, that they keep hitting the same line in the same document. 

Perry gets in a claim that Hunter Biden was “frequenting prostitutes.” So if that was on your BINGO card, there you go.

Boy, a lot of people seem to send money to “The Biden Family.” Which would be … who? Perry is really big on “the Biden family.” 

And now it’s snooze along with Turley time.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:28:23 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Greene shouts out “what about the Jan. 6 defendants.” Presumably she means it was wrong to prosecute insurgents. 

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:26:17 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Following Casar’s question, Democrats raise their hands. Republicans do not.

So much for equal justice under the law.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:24:30 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

“I for one am grateful we have an independent judicial system where a president’s son, and a former president, can be investigated and prosecuted if they violate the law. It is my firm belief that hunter and Trump should both face trial and, if found guilty, face the consequence of the crimes they’ve been accused of. Can everyone on the Oversight Committee say the same thing?” — Rep. Greg Casar

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:21:15 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Casar is doing a good job of explaining how a big factor behind the Republican inquiry is to just make everyone look corrupt. Because if everyone is corrupt, then Trump’s corruption, and theirs, is no big deal.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:19:48 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Rep. Greg Casar pulls up a quote from Jordan calling attempting to impeach Trump “political theater.”

“If you thought impeaching Trump was political theater, what would you call this? This, this is a disgrace.”

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:17:40 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Goldman enters the letter that Fallon was talking about, which actually shows that Shokin was not investigating Burisma. It won’t make a dent in Republican’s claims.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:16:01 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Fallon halls out the 1023. The unverified 1023. The widely debunked 1023 that is based on the repeatedly debunked Burisma conspiracy theory.

And now we’re deep into Shokin territory. Really, that leaning on this five years later is kind of astounding. 

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:13:27 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Fallon keeps saying “say it with me” like he leading a chant. No one is saying it with him.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:12:07 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

And we’re back with Comer now sitting in the big chair.

Rep. Pat Fallon is first up with the big news that Hunter Biden spoke with his father. This may actually be shocking to some Republicans.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:09:29 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

In general, Democrats regard these hearings as a team sport. They talk in advance, divide up topics, and use their statements to support each other and leverage a series of themes.

Republicans view them as a chance to promote themselves individually by showing that they are the cleverest, meanest, sneariest of all. Which is how you get someone shouting about China, and someone else talking about Romania, and a dozen people all using the same line because no one bothered to even notice that their colleagues already covered it.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 6:02:39 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Finally, Jordan hammers in a 10 minute break. Summing everything up so far.

Another House GOP staffer tells me “Comer and staff botched this bad.” Tells me the information presented by Republicans has been “confusing” and Democrats are “on message.” “How can you not be better prepared for this?”

— Stephen Neukam (@stephen_neukam) September 28, 2023

Yes, we are still here. And they are still there. And you are still better off just getting thing thing drip-fed to you at a safe distance.

Think of this as the layer of lead that stands between your brain and the kryptonite-level nonsense spewing from the House chambers. Considering the utterly disconnected from reality FUD that we’ve heard so far, we may have to increase the thickness.

Back to the fray…

Live coverage: Republican impeachment inquiry

Posted on by Mark Sumner

Republicans begin their impeachment inquiry of President Joe Biden today. Appropriately enough, they’re bringing in three “witnesses” who haven’t witnessed anything. One is accountant Bruce Dubinsky, whose expertise consists of going on Fox News to attack Hunter Biden. Another is a former member of Donald Trump’s transition team, Eileen O’Connor, who served in the Department of Justice two decades ago. The last member of this Republican dream team is, of course, “legal scholar” Jonathan Turley, the attorney who ponied up to defend Donald Trump during his impeachment hearings and the go-to choice when Republicans need support for their most ridiculous theories.

None of these three have any connection to Hunter Biden or President Joe Biden. They have no knowledge of the events, no involvement in any investigation, no special knowledge, and no reason to appear.

So, if nothing else, this is going to be a perfect illustration of just what this “inquiry” is about.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 3:43:54 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Rep. Lynch just demolished one of the GOP witnesses pic.twitter.com/tNPsmZZv6N

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) September 28, 2023

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 3:42:44 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Rep. Mike Turner spends most of his time praising the wisdom of Jonathan Turley. And again, we’re going down the road to Burisma. 

Turner brings up the fact that the attorney general has a special prosecutor looking ino classified materials that Biden already turned over and strings a new conspiracy theory that Hunter Biden was selling classified info. So that’s at least a fun new unsupported line of BS.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 3:37:55 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Lynch says he’s surprised that he walked into this meeting with supposed witnesses and didn’t find Rudy Giuliani, the one person who can actually answer questions about how the Burisma story started. 

Gerhardt agrees that it “seems obvious” Giuliani should be there.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 3:36:24 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Rep. Stephen Lynch points out that not one of the witnesses Republicans brought has any knowledge of any wrongdoing by President Biden, any evidence about Hunter Biden, or anything really to contribute to this processes.

Lynch points out that O’Conner’s article “You’d go to prison for what Biden did” was actually “You’d go to prison for what Hunter Biden did.” O’Conner says she left out the “Hunter” because she was “cutting down words to say inside my five minutes.”

A pretty important word, says Lynch.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 3:32:30 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Jordan and Turley tag teaming the idea that you don’t need any evidence to do an impeachment inquiry, and boy are they spending a lot of time defending just sitting here today.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 3:29:50 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Jordan jumps fully into the Burisma claims as the basis of this investigation. Which is an absolutely full on perfect, since that’s has been so roundly disproven since 2019.

Jordan is back in front of the cameras screaming. Because being louder makes things more important.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 3:27:38 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Norton throws back to Raskin so he can ask Gerhardt about how Republicans aren't concerned about the $2 billion pocketed by Jared Kushner.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 3:25:06 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton goes back to Gerhardt who emphasis that there is no credible evidence against President Biden, and that impeachment without evidence doesn’t just trivialize impeachment, but “trivializes the Constitution and runs roughshod over the rule of law.”

Note that is is Democrats who are actually asking for witnesses to the Burisma deal to be called, while Republicans are quickly shutting down that effort. Because Republicans want to use the claims against President Biden without any threat of the truth getting in the way.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 3:21:34 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Smith gets his turn to talk about the “700 pages of documents” from his fantastic press conference. 

He asks O’Conner a question about “Biden family” and “the family” are apparently a thing that is capable of violating campaign laws. 

This thing is so scripted that O’Conner is thrown off because she admits that she thought Smith was going to ask her a different question about a different part of the conspiracy theory. O’Conner also points to Dubinsky as someone who can fill Smith in on how some part of this “family” worked. Because it’s an ensemble piece.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 3:16:34 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Raskin asks Gerhardt about whether any impeachment inquiry has been launched without a vote of the full House. Nope. How about impeachment inquiries without evidence of a crime? Nope. Gerhardt agrees with Raskin that hearing from Giuliani and Parnas is important. 

Raskin asks Gerhardt for a theory that Trump didn’t deserve to be impeached for Jan. 6, but Biden does deserve to be impeached for … whatever. Gerhardt says he cannot. 

Raskin moves to enter a letter from Parnas into the record.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 3:11:50 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Jordan starts off with the $250,000 that was sent to Hunter Biden by wire which used Joe Biden’s home address which was insta-debunked after Republicans tried to spring this yesterday. 

So, Jordan is now asking Dubinsky about how this matches his experience of fraudsters, which is exactly why Dubinsky is there. So that every theory that Jordan, Comer, or Smith wants to posit can be supported.

Then Jordan turns to Turley, who has handily prepared for Republicans a list of crimes they might consider using to impeach President Biden, since they don’t have anything. This whole back and forth with Turley is fantastic, because it amounts to Turley flat-out advising the Republicans on how to conduct their case. 

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 3:06:18 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

And lord help us, now we have to get through all the questions from members. So here we go...

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 3:05:54 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Professor Michael Gerhardt starts off warning against the trivializing of impeachment inquiries, and quoting Alexander Hamilton from the Federalist papers. 

Gerhardt goes back through the evidence that Jordan gave, simplifies it, and shows where it not only doesn’t come close to justifying impeachment, but doesn’t show that President Biden did anything wrong. Most importantly, Gerhardt points out that all the things they are doing—criticizing the actions of prosecutors, talking about whether Hunter Biden’s deal was proper—are outside of the functions of the Committee.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 2:59:42 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Dubinsky just said that shell companies “more often than not” are used for illicit purposes.

Someone might want to get in touch with the guy who has over 500 of those shell companies. (Hint: That’s Donald Trump)

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 2:58:34 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Bruce Dubinsky is hear to tell us he knows all about fraudsters, fraud, and how fraudsters move their money around. His whole testimony seems to boil down to saying “where there’s smoke there’s fire” except he can’t say anything about whether there’s any actual fire. Or smoke.

Expect all his testimony to be about his “experience with fraudsters.” Republicans are going to use him to paint a picture of Joe Biden’s family moving money around through shell companies. Evidence be damned,

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 2:55:51 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Eileen O’Conner says she was “invited to share her comments on Hunter Biden as a private citizen.” That’s—interesting. And then she moves directly to acting as a proxy for IRS “whistleblowers” Gary Shapley and Joseph Ziegler.

Then she talks about his Wall Street Journal editorial titled “Throw Hunter Biden’s plea deal in the trash” And her second editorial titled “You’d go to prison for what Biden did.” If you wondered why she’s there, now you know.

O’Conner goes on to extend a new conspiracy theory that the IRS and DOJ were somehow making a deal with Hunter Biden to try and cut off Shapley. Everything she said absolutely contradicts Trump-appointed U.S. Attorney David Weiss. But again, no one is bothering to hear from people who were really involved.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 2:48:30 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Turley starts off the affair by talking about how he believes the House has “passed the threshold” for the inquiry. Then goes on to admit that everything is simply an allegation.

For what it’s worth, I allege that Turley is a hack. Can we impeach him?

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 2:44:56 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Now Jordan introduces the witnesses. Oddly enough, their appearances on Fox and their connections to Trump have gone unmentioned.

In addition to the Republican witnesses, Democrats have called law professor Michael Gerhardt.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 2:40:30 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

After some wrangling, Jordan goes through the motion of tabling Raskin’s call for for witnesses who are actual witnesses. It is, of course, promptly blocked along partisan lines.

Because the last thing Republicans want in this hearing is someone who actually knows something about the claims they are making.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 2:36:20 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Raskin insists that Rudy Giuliani and his convicted partner in crime Lev Parnas be called as witnesses, asks for a vote. Jordan just refuses to do it.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 2:34:35 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Raskin has spent the last ten minutes just eating this hearing alive. 

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 2:31:57 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Raskin once again goes through the steps showing that the firing of Shokin was part of a fight against corruption in Ukraine that was backed by multiple governments and by Republicans in the U.S. Senate. It wasn’t until years after the event that the whole “Biden did it to help Burisma” scheme was concocted by Giuliani and Trump.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 2:28:54 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

“If the Republicans had a smoking gun, or even a dripping water pistol, they would be presenting it today, but they’ve got nothing on Joe Biden. All they can do is return to the thoroughly demolished lie that Rudy Giuliani and Donald Trump launched five years ago — the Burisma conspiracy theory.” — Rep. Jamie Raskin

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 2:28:27 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Raskin making it clear that if they had to put this farce up for a vote, Jordan, Comer, and Smith don’t have the votes to get this inquiry started. It’s only because Rep. Kevin McCarthy bypassed all the rules he had thumped during Trump’s impeachment. 

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 2:23:38 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Raskin starts with a series of quotes from Republicans that are genuinely fun. Also, Raskin got in a quote from “Alfred Pennyworth in the Dark Knight,” which is a pretty good illustration of just where this hearing is taking place.

 

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 2:19:44 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Rep. Jamie Raskin points out that since this whole farce didn’t get a vote in the House, all the attacks on President Biden are a violation of House rules. But Jordan just says that’s okay, Biden can be smeared at will.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 2:17:39 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

And now we get Rep. Jim Jordan. How also jumps right to the Ukraine false claims.

This whole thing about the prosecutor in Ukraine, Viktor Shokin, has been debunked over, and over, and over. Really, it’s just perfect that this is already turning out to be the heart of this “inquiry.” 

The second part of this is going to be how Joe Biden somehow controlled the Department of Justice all through the Trump administration. Which is just high fantasy.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 2:12:54 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

And Rep. Jason Smith jumps right into the repeatedly debunked claims about Joe Biden in Ukraine. Because of course they’re going to go there.

UPDATE: Thursday, Sep 28, 2023 · 2:09:09 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner

Rep. James Comer starts right off claiming to have a “mountain” of evidence and treating every claim as if it is an established fact. It’s always easier to conduct a trial if you don’t have to prove anything. Maybe they’ll just skip right to the end.

YouTube Video

Republican impeachment inquiry gets off to a perfect start

Posted on by Mark Sumner

On Wednesday afternoon, Republicans on the House Ways and Means Committee held a press conference to announce the start of their impeachment inquiry against President Joe Biden. If this was intended as a preview of what’s to come, it was perfect.

At that conference, NBC reporter Ryan Nobles pointed out that much of the supposed evidence took place at a time not only before Joe Biden was elected, but at a point where he wasn’t even a candidate. But time … is apparently a very fuzzy concept to Rep. Jason Smith. The resulting exchange was hilarious.

U.S. Rep. Jason Smith (R-MO) melts down as an NBC reporter questions GOP claims of DOJ political interference in favor of Joe Biden before he was president. pic.twitter.com/Afm75G5CDq

— Heartland Signal (@HeartlandSignal) September 27, 2023

Nobles: “Can you explain the timing of the Aug. 6 WhatsApp message? Why is that evidence of some wrongdoing?”

Smith: “I’m not an expert on the timeline. I would love to have, um, President Biden and his family to tell us about all the timeline.”

Nobles : “But if he's not the president or the vice president at that time, where’s the wrongdoing? He wasn’t even a candidate for president at that time.”

Smith: “He was a candidate.”

Nobles : “On Aug. 6 of 2017?”

Smith: “So apparently, apparently … what source are you with?”

Nobles: “I’m with NBC.”

Smith: “So apparently, you’ll never believe us.”

Nobles: “I’m not saying I don’t believe you. I’m asking you a very direct question. You presented a piece of evidence that you say came on Aug. 6 2017, that demonstrates that Joe Biden was using political influence to help his son.”

Smith: “What’s that?”

Nobles: “The WhatsApp message you put up. How does that demonstrate that there was some sort of political influence put over him if at that time he wasn’t a political figure, he’s not an elected official?”

Smith: “I’m definitely not going to pinpoint one item.”

Nobles: “You presented it. It was your first thing that you brought.”

Smith: “So, apparently you don’t agree with it.”

Nobles: “It’s not that I don’t agree with it. I’m asking you to explain it.”

Smith: “I’ll take the next question.”

The inquiry gets underway today with three witnesses slated to testify:

  • Bruce Dubinsky, an accountant who has previously appeared on Fox News as a commentator about Hunter Biden.

  • Eileen O’Connor, a former assistant attorney general at the Justice Department’s Tax Division during the George W. Bush administration and a member of Donald Trump’s transition team.

  • Jonathan Turley, an attorney who Republicans also called as a witness to defend Trump during his impeachment hearings.

So, the first three witnesses include no one who has any direct knowledge of anything involving either Hunter Biden or President Joe Biden, no one who has served in public office in the last two decades, and no one with any connection to any of the officials or events that are the supposed focus of the inquiry.

That also sounds perfect. It all gets underway at 10 AM ET. And yes, we will be covering it.

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