Category: Impeachment

Former GOP skeptics now support impeachment probe

Posted on by Laura Clawson

Speaker Kevin McCarthy announced an impeachment inquiry without a full House vote, at a time when he didn’t appear to have the votes. Republicans have a four-seat House majority, and currently, more than four Republicans indicated that they didn’t see grounds for an inquiry. But McCarthy spoke the support he needed into existence. The kind of ostensibly moderate Republican who didn’t want to see an impeachment inquiry will nonetheless go along with leadership for the sake of partisan advantage.

See, for instance, Rep. Don Bacon. In August, Bacon told NBC News, “We should have more confidence that actual high crimes and misdemeanors occurred before starting a formal impeachment inquiry.” Last week, as McCarthy announced his voteless inquiry, Bacon said, “As of now I don't support” an inquiry, because it “should be based on evidence of a crime that points directly to President Biden, or if the President doesn't cooperate by not providing documents.”

Less than a week later, Bacon’s position has shifted to cautious support. “I don’t think it’s healthy or good for our country. So I wanted to set a high bar. I want to do it carefully. I want to do it conscientiously, do it meticulously," Bacon said. "But it’s been done. So, at this point, we’ll see what the facts are.”

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No person who has observed House Republicans over the past eight months could possibly believe that they will proceed carefully, conscientiously, or meticulously. But Bacon has shown how much his opposition is worth—and how much it will be worth if he ever has to decide how to vote on impeachment.

Similarly, Rep. David Joyce said in August, “You hear a lot of rumor and innuendo … but that’s not fact to me. As a former prosecutor, I think there has to be facts, and I think there has to be due process that we follow, and I’ve not seen any of that today.” Now? In a statement, Joyce said, “I support Speaker McCarthy’s decision to direct the House Committees on Oversight, Judiciary, and Ways and Means to open a formal impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden.” What’s more, he’s “confident” that the committee leaders conducting the inquiry—Oversight Chair James Comer, Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan, and Ways and Means Chair Jason Smith—“will conduct thoughtful and thorough investigations into allegations against the President, which I will carefully review.”

Saying you’re confident Comer and Jordan will be “thoughtful and thorough” is kind of a tell that nothing you’re saying should be believed.

People like Bacon and Joyce know there’s no there there, but once McCarthy said the inquiry was happening, they fell in line. Because they’re Republicans, and the only principle in the Republican Party is power. The problem for them now is that if the inquiry wraps up quickly (not likely—Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene is calling for it to be “long and excruciatingly painful”), they’ll have to take a vote on it. But if it doesn’t wrap up quickly, it runs the serious risk of alienating voters and showing that House Republicans are unserious about governing.

Strikingly, the House Republican who is speaking out against the impeachment inquiry most loudly is Rep. Ken Buck, a Freedom Caucus member who wrote an op-ed in The Washington Post calling the current inquiry a “flimsy excuse for an impeachment.” In the politics of today’s Republican Party, being a member of the far right entitles Buck to take that kind of stance, while Republicans who represent districts Biden won in 2020 have to regularly show their fealty to the party by supporting extreme positions.

And let’s be real—Buck is likely to end up voting for impeachment, too, if the House ever gets to that point rather than engaging in a dragged-out show trial.

What do you do if you're associated with one of the biggest election fraud scandals in recent memory? If you're Republican Mark Harris, you try running for office again! On this week's episode of "The Downballot," we revisit the absolutely wild story of Harris' 2018 campaign for Congress, when one of his consultants orchestrated a conspiracy to illegally collect blank absentee ballots from voters and then had his team fill them out before "casting" them. Officials wound up tossing the results of this almost-stolen election, but now Harris is back with a new bid for the House—and he won't shut up about his last race, even blaming Democrats for the debacle.

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Ken Paxton was acquitted at his impeachment trial, but he still faces legal troubles

Posted on by Associated Press

For years, the powers and protections that come with being Texas’ top lawyer have helped Ken Paxton fend off ethics complains, criminal charges and an FBI investigation.

With the Texas Senate’s Saturday vote to acquit Paxton of corruption charges at his impeachment trial the Republican has once again demonstrated his rare political resilience. And he retains the shield of the attorney general's office in legal battles still to come.

After being cleared, Paxton, 60, thanked his lawyers for “exposing the absurdity” of the “false allegations” against him, and he promised to resume doing legal battle with the administration of President Joe Biden.

"The weaponization of the impeachment process to settle political differences is not only wrong, it is immoral and corrupt," he said in a statement. “Now that this shameful process is over, my work to defend our constitutional rights will resume.”

Back in office, Paxton nonetheless still faces serious risk on three fronts: an ongoing a federal investigation into the same allegations that led to his impeachment; a disciplinary proceeding over his effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election; and felony securities fraud charges dating to 2015.

Here's what to know about each.

THE FEDERAL INVESTIGATION

Paxton came under FBI investigation in 2020 when eight of his top deputies reported him for allegedly breaking the law to help a wealthy donor, Austin real estate developer Nate Paul.

The former deputies' accusation that Paxton abused his power to help Paul were at the core of Paxton's impeachment. Lawmakers in the Texas House of Representatives say it was the still-open question of funding a $3.3 million settlement in a lawsuit brought by four of the deputies that sparked the impeachment investigation.

Several of Paxton's former deputies took the witness stand against him. They recounted going to the FBI and testified that the attorney general tried to help Paul fend of a separate FBI investigation

They also testified that Paul employed a woman with whom Paxton had an extramarital affair. Another former employee, Drew Wicker, said Paxton second-in-command later discouraged him from speaking with the FBI.

Paul was indicted in June on charges of making false statements to banks. He has pleaded not guilty and was not called to testify at the impeachment trial.

The federal investigation of Paxton has dragged on for years and was shifted in February from a prosecutors in Texas to ones in Washington, D.C. In August, federal prosecutors began using a grand jury in San Antonio to examine Paxton and Paul's dealings, according to two people with knowledge of the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity because of secrecy rules around grand jury proceedings.

One said the grand jury heard from Wicker, Paxton’s former personal aide. At the impeachment trial, Wicker testified that he once heard a contractor tell Paxton he would need to check with “Nate” about the cost of renovations to the attorney general’s Austin home.

Paxton has consistently denied wrongdoing. One of his defense attorneys, Dan Cogdell, acknowledged in August that authorities were still interviewing witnesses but said the “case will go nowhere at the end of the day.”

THE SECURITIES FRAUD CASE

In 2015, Paxton was indicted on charges of defrauding investors in a Dallas-area tech startup by not disclosing he was being paid by the company, called Servergy, to recruit them. He faces five to 99 years in prison if convicted and has pleaded not guilty.

The indictments were handed up just months after Paxton was sworn in as attorney general. He won second and third terms despite them.

Paxton's trial has been delayed by legal debate over whether it should be heard in the Dallas area or Houston, changes in which judge would handle it and a protracted battle over how much the special prosecutors should get paid.

Weeks after the Republican-led Texas House voted to impeach Paxton, the state's high criminal court ruled his trial would proceed in Houston. The judge overseeing it said in August that she would set a trial date after the impeachment trial.

Cogdell said that month that if Paxton were removed from office it would open the possibility of him making a plea agreement in the case.

THE DISCIPLINARY HEARING

Also on hold during Paxton's impeachment trial was an ethics case brought by the state bar.

In 2020, Paxton asked the U.S. Supreme Court to, effectively, overturn then-President Donald Trump's electoral defeat by Joe Biden based on bogus claims of fraud. The high court threw out the request.

Afterward, the State Bar of Texas received a series of complaints alleging that Paxton and a deputy had committed processional misconduct with the suit. The bar didn't initially take up the complaints but later launched an investigation.

Last year, the bar sued seeking unspecified discipline for Paxton and his second-in-command, alleging they were “dishonest" with the Supreme Court.

Paxton dismissed the bar's suits as “meritless” political attacks. The attorney general's office has argued that because it is an executive branch agency and the bar is part of the judicial branch, the cases run afoul of separation of powers under the state constitution.

A judge overseeing the bar's case against the deputy, Brent Webster, accepted this argument. But he was reversed on appeal in July. That month, another court scheduled arguments in the disciplinary case against Paxton only to delay them when it became clear they would fall in the middle of his impeachment trial.

The attorney general's office continued to defend Paxton in the case even after he was suspended from office. If he's found to have violated ethics rules, Paxton faces the prospect of disbarment, suspension, or a lesser punishments.

Would impeachment inquiry shut down with the government? Maybe

Posted on by Joan McCarter

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy tried to quell his raucous caucus by telling them they can’t force a government shutdown while continuing their “Biden crime family” investigations and impeachment inquiry against President Joe Biden. He previewed that argument a few weeks ago during a Fox News interview. “If we shut down, all of government shuts it down—investigations and everything else—it hurts the American public,” he said.

Maybe that’s why he decided to let his rabid weasels loose in an impeachment inquiry, thinking they would be so caught up in the bloodthirst that they wouldn’t want it to be derailed by a shutdown. The problem is that McCarthy’s argument is not entirely true, and plenty of the Republican “investigators” intend to keep on chasing their tails, no matter what.

Some of them didn’t even connect the two things until reporters asked them about it. “I have no idea, I’m hopeful that we don’t have that scenario,” Rep. James Comer told The Messenger. He’s the Oversight Committee chair who has to keep publicly admitting that he’s got nuthin’ on the president, despite devoting months and months to the quest. So, yes, it’s totally believable that Comer didn’t even bother to think about whether his pet investigations might be affected.

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His counterpart in wild-goose chasing, Rep. Jim Jordan, has thought about it. “We’re gonna do our job no matter what happens,” the Judiciary Committee chair said. He threw in, “We’re not looking to shut down the government.” Seems Jim has some catching up to do with his Freedom Caucus colleagues.

What Jordan isn’t saying is that he would be happy to force his committee staff to continue working during a shutdown, even though they wouldn’t be getting paid. Because that’s how it works. Members of Congress get paid during shutdowns because that’s what the Constitution mandates. Their salaries are not included in the annual appropriations for the legislative branch. Unless that appropriations bill passes before Oct. 1 and a shutdown is averted, the people who work in Congress but aren’t elected members won’t get paid.

Members can deem some of their staff to be “essential” and force them to work without pay during shutdowns. In the case of Comer and Jordan, they could very well decide that their committee staffers have to keep working, which they would have to do without pay until the shutdown gets resolved.

“I’ve never seen a situation where there’s a potential shutdown and this thing running along simultaneously,” Rep. Tom Cole told The Messenger. He’s chair of the Rules Committee. “They certainly couldn’t pay the staffers. At some point, people aren’t coming into work for free, as patriotic as they all are.”

Staffers might not keep coming in, but the impeachment inquiry could keep going, according to one analysis from the last time this threat came up, at the end of 2019. The inquiry likely would continue, because it’s not like the staff would be that essential in “investigating” anyway—there’s no evidence to collect, and no actual crime to probe. Comer and Jordan and their buddies are just making it up as they go along anyway. Paid professionals might just get in their way.

Whether they decide to run with the impeachment inquiry anyway depends on just how self-destructive they’re feeling. Because neither of the two things—impeachment or a government shutdown—are popular with voters. Most Americans don’t think impeachment is warranted, and a large majority are opposed to a shutdown.

If a shutdown happens, Republicans will be blamed. If the only thing Congress is doing while many government services are closed is going after Biden on the basis of unproven and ridiculous conspiracy theories, well, McCarthy might as well just hand the keys to the place over to Democratic Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries. Democrats will have run of the place after 2024.

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What do you do if you're associated with one of the biggest election fraud scandals in recent memory? If you're Republican Mark Harris, you try running for office again! On this week's episode of "The Downballot," we revisit the absolutely wild story of Harris' 2018 campaign for Congress, when one of his consultants orchestrated a conspiracy to illegally collect blank absentee ballots from voters and then had his team fill them out before "casting" them. Officials wound up tossing the results of this almost-stolen election, but now Harris is back with a new bid for the House—and he won't shut up about his last race, even blaming Democrats for the debacle.

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‘Do your job, bud’: There’s a lot to learn from Fetterman’s takedown of Gaetz

Posted on by Aldous J Pennyfarthing

There are lots and lots of legitimate things to criticize Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz over, as the fashion-allergic Sen. John Fetterman clearly knows. So when Gaetz called Fetterman out over his seven (or more) thread-ly sins, Fetterman was prepared.

Haute couture isn’t for everyone, of course. Some people are Beau Brummells and Dapper Dans, while others are more than content to be Dumpster Dons. Gaetz’s own sartorial history suggests he’s keen on dressing for the ladies (and allegedly girls)—when he’s not busy dressing down teens.

And during a recent interview with convicted criminal Steve Bannon—who, ironically, looks like a pair of Kirkland sweatpants trying to screw a sack of mulch—Gaetz launched a few tepid bons mots in Fetterman’s direction. Fetterman responded with a bracing dose of reality for the Lilliputian across the aisle.

Gaetz, in a clearly prewritten monologue (he literally checks his notes about a minute and a half in), seems determined to take down the good senator from Pennsylvania after he mocked House Republicans and their revenge impeachment inquiry earlier in the week.

The evidence against Joe Biden is overwhelming. A first-year law student could win this case for impeachment before a fair jury. Unfortunately, the United States Senate isn’t a fair jury. It’s full of fashion icons like John Fetterman. While the Senate will be the platform,… pic.twitter.com/LsWyNrhsjW

— Rep. Matt Gaetz (@RepMattGaetz) September 13, 2023

In over two uninterrupted minutes, Gaetz doesn’t get around to answering Bannon’s question, so here’s a partial transcript, Why? Because I love you.

BANNON: “Congressman Gaetz, I can tell you from my sources around Washington, D.C., they’re blaming you [for the impeachment inquiry]. They’re saying McCarthy was rattled by you. He knew you were going to make the speech today, he knew it was going to be powerful, he knew you would put him on notice, and put him on the clock, and this is why he ran out and made the hostage video. Your response and observations, sir.”

GAETZ: “First of all, that is the best dressed we have ever seen John Fetterman. His shirt had both buttons and the entire pant was not elastic. There were elastic features, but it was not exclusively elastic. And so, I don’t know what tent store he bought that muumuu at, but it appears to be new and I am grateful that he is really upping his game in that regard ...”

BANNON: [Giggles with glee while curb-stomping irony to death with his dandruff-mottled joggin’ Crocs.]

Gaetz then waxes rhapsodic about Biden impeachment bullshit that hasn’t been remotely proven—according to these Republicans, anyway—and, in a weird detour for a Republican, goes after George W. Bush’s WMD lies. Then he doubles down on the fashion insults while predicting the failure of the GOP’s wholly made-up impeachment case: “This is not a hard story to tell. A first-year law student could win this case before a fair jury. Now, the United States Senate isn’t a fair jury. It’s full of great fashion icons like John Fetterman. But I think that the Senate will be the platform, and the American people will be the jury when we put that case on before them.”

Our fearless Fetty minced no words in his response.

Government shutdown in t-minus 16 days. Instead of crying about how I dress, how about you get your shit together and do your job, bud? https://t.co/97vQMURDZX

— Senator John Fetterman (@SenFettermanPA) September 14, 2023

For the nontweeters:

FETTERMAN: “Government shutdown in t-minus 16 days. Instead of crying about how I dress, how about you get your shit together and do your job, bud?”

Now, if you need the lowdown on why Republicans’ entire impeachment case is naught but frothy horseshit, Daily Kos’ own Mark Sumner dropped his latest wonderful primer on the manufactured allegations on Thursday. Gaetz’s—and the GOP’s—strategy is clear: Muddy the waters among low-information (i.e., Republican) voters enough to make President Joe Biden look corrupt—all so they can shove the most corrupt human on the planet down our throats for another four years.

After all, if everyone’s dishonest, you might as well vote for the one with the most felony convictions.

So instead of getting down into the wonky weeds on this “issue” here, let’s take a cue from Sen. Fetterman, who’s treated the GOP’s disingenuous efforts with the dismissiveness they deserve. 

Again, here was his response—which is also included in the above clip—to questions about the GOP’s fake impeachment push. And it was exactly as snarky and scornful as warranted.

LMAOOOO John Fetterman's reaction to impeachment for the WIN!!!🤣🤣pic.twitter.com/KDl1RSeclT

— BrooklynDad_Defiant!☮️ (@mmpadellan) September 12, 2023

That’s really the only reaction anyone should bother to have over this impeachment nonsense, but even before House Speaker Kevin McCarthy unilaterally announced the launch of a formal impeachment inquiry this week, Fetterman was being unusually blunt about the GOP’s upcoming, and no doubt soon-to-be-disastrous, Fyre Liar Festival.

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On Sept. 6, as Republicans were telegraphing plans for their latest waste of time, Fetterman literally dared them to go ahead with their half-baked schemes.

“Go ahead, do it. I dare you,” Fetterman said. “Your man has what, three or four indictments now? Trump has a mug shot, and he’s been impeached twice.”

Fetterman also correctly noted that the impeachment push “would just be like a big circle jerk on the fringe right” and “would diminish what impeachment really means.”

Well, yeah, that’s at least part of the reason they’re doing this. If impeachment no longer means anything, Trump’s long-demonstrated penchant for double-fisting big, frosty mugs o’ crime might not seem like such a deal-breaker. Nor will his (likely) upcoming felony convictions. 

In fact, Democrats should think about letting Fetterman lead on this issue, if only because he’s a genuine human being who abhors political double-talk and can connect with ordinary voters on a host of real issues. When he says, “Sometimes you just gotta call their bullshit,” people will be more likely to listen than if, say, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer says it.

RELATED STORY: Sen. John Fetterman is back—and telling it like it is

And if we hit on the right messaging—with a combination of Fetterman-like bluntness and ordinary, workaday fact-checking—the GOP’s impeachment push might end up pushing them right off the table, as happened to the party following Newt & co.’s dogged pursuit of Bill Clinton in the ‘90s. 

NBC News, Sept. 6:

Some vulnerable Republicans ... are skeptical about opening an impeachment inquiry.

Fetterman said impeachment would be a political "loser" for House Republicans, along with the looming threat of a government shutdown if they can't reach a funding deal before the end of the month.

“I’m just tired of a couple of them over there, talking like they’re hard a--es," Fetterman said. "They just keep pushing it.”

Yeah, they do, and they’re clearly not being honest about their motivations. Luckily Sen. Fetterman is here to push their lying faces in their own barmy bullshit. Let’s join him!

With the November election just weeks away, it’s time to get out the vote. Daily Kos and our partners have numerous opportunities waiting for you!

Check out Aldous J. Pennyfarthing’s four-volume Trump-trashing compendium, including the finale, Goodbye, Asshat: 101 Farewell Letters to Donald Trump, at this link. Or, if you prefer a test drive, you can download the epilogue to Goodbye, Asshat for the low, low price of FREE.  

Watch Republican congressman tie himself in knots presenting Biden ‘evidence’ on Fox

Posted on by Walter Einenkel

The far-right wing of the Republican Party has compelled House Speaker Kevin McCarthy to call for an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden. The biggest problem with this move? After nine months of Republican-led House committee investigations into the president and his son Hunter, the GOP has come up with bupkis.

Fox Business host Maria Bartiromo took time away from purposefully misinforming the public about Trump’s false election-fraud claims to discuss the impeachment inquiry into President Biden. Her guest was Missouri Republican Rep. Jason Smith. In a clip tweeted by journalist Aaron Rupar, Bartiromo asks Smith what he thinks is “the most damning evidence that you all have to suggest bribery.” She proceeds to reiterate some vague circumstantial evidence as well as some completely unsubstantiated claims made using big financial numbers.

And Smith responds, “Those are all great questions that we need answers to.”

How about that for mental jujitsu?

RELATED STORY: House Republican admits he can't find any Biden crimes

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Gone are the days when Smith was calling the evidence-based impeachment of former President Donald Trump “outrageous attacks from the liberal mob majority that consistently puts politics before people.” He said that Trump’s “impeachment circus should have never been started” and was “a complete disgrace to our country,” but when it comes to Republicans starting their own “circus,” he has no qualms whatsoever.

Here are a couple more times Republicans had a chance to offer up real evidence:

Rep. James Comer has spent most of the Biden administration’s time in office running an investigation into the Biden family—and he’s turned up nothing.

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And here’s Florida man Matt Gaetz, who represents the Sunshine State’s 1st Congressional District, arguing that the non-evidence he has is, actually, indeed evidence. You just have to look at it the right(-wing) way.

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Sign the petition: No to shutdowns, no to Biden impeachment, no to Republicans

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Kerry talks with Drew Linzer, director of the online polling company Civiqs. Drew tells us what the polls say about voters’ feelings toward President Joe Biden and Donald Trump, and what the results would be if the two men were to, say … run against each other for president in 2024. Oh yeah, Drew polled to find out who thinks Donald Trump is guilty of the crimes he’s been indicted for, and whether or not he should see the inside of a jail cell.

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The New York Times gives impeachment the both-sides treatment

Posted on by Laura Clawson

House Republicans are engaging in a completely partisan, evidence-free impeachment inquiry—but Peter Baker of The New York Times wants to talk about how the White House is treating this as a political issue. And just to get this out of the way right off the bat, the paragraph count before Baker acknowledges that Republicans have no evidence against Biden is seven.

In paragraph eight, he gets around to, “The Republican investigation so far has not produced concrete evidence of a crime by the president, as even some Republicans have conceded.” Even there, the implication is that the Republican investigation has produced some evidence, and they just need to make it concrete. In reality, the Republican investigation has produced no evidence that the president has engaged in any misconduct, let alone a crime.

Before the reader gets to that halfhearted admission, though, they’ve had to plow through a great deal of fretting about how the White House is treating this as political:

Forget the weighty legal arguments over the meaning of high crimes and misdemeanors or the constitutional history of the removal process. Mr. Biden’s defense team has chosen to take on the Republican threat by convincing Americans that it is nothing more than base partisanship driven by a radical opposition.

How exactly would Baker propose the White House make weighty legal arguments when there is no legal case against Biden? When after months of fruitless investigations into Biden, Republicans have simply decided to go ahead with claiming to have found the things they looked for and didn’t find? What would he have the White House or any other Democrats do in response?

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At one point, Baker quotes Julian Epstein, a Clinton-era lawyer for the Democrats of the House Judiciary Committee. “Overall, this has not been handled well by the White House,” Epstein argued. “The team there has violated the cardinal sin of investigations — allowing new information to trickle out continuously and while being stuck in stale Baghdad Bob-like ‘no evidence’ denials.” But if the White House hadn’t allowed new information to come out organically, the Peter Bakers of the world would have said that Biden was suppressing evidence! And how is the White House supposed to characterize the lack of evidence other than to point out that lack? 

As always, Democrats are damned if they do and damned if they don’t. If Democrats were to cede the political fight and allow Republicans to beat the crap out of Biden while the Democratic Party was busy making “weighty legal arguments over the meaning of high crimes and misdemeanors or the constitutional history of the removal process,” it might satisfy Baker for a minute, but it would be a disastrous course of action. As it is, through sheer repetition and relying on lousy media coverage that doesn’t call a lie a lie, Republicans have convinced a substantial fraction of the public that there must be a there there when it comes to Biden and corruption. Imagine if Democrats voluntarily disarmed.

As entries in the Peter Baker oeuvre go, this one is pretty pedestrian and uninspired, nowhere near as creative as the time he wondered at length if it was a problem for Biden that Donald Trump was getting all the attention by being indicted. You didn’t have to be The New York Times Pitchbot to know that the Times would respond to the White House documenting Republican lies about the basis for impeachment and calling on the media to cover it better by fretting about the White House violating norms. As tired and predictable as it is, though, it’s still harmful to have the Times pretending there’s equivalence between a fraudulent impeachment inquiry and attempts to push back on such an inquiry by pointing out that it is fraudulent.

If it feels more like a political campaign than a serious legal proceeding, that is because at this point it is, at least as the White House sees it and would like others to. In the first 24 hours of their inquiry, the House Republicans made no new requests for documents, issued no new subpoenas, demanded no new testimony and laid out no potential articles of impeachment. Instead, they went to the cameras to call Mr. Biden a liar and a crook, so Mr. Biden’s defenders went to the cameras to return fire.

Note the structure here: The White House wants people to see it as political. There’s strong evidence that it is, yet it is always the White House’s pushback efforts that lead Baker’s coverage, as if they came first. Reality is the reverse.

Matt Gaetz’s impeachment schtick didn’t fly with CNN anchor

Posted on by Walter Einenkel

The main reason that Republicans and other conservative elected officials like to appear on Fox News and Newsmax while staying away from traditional media outlets: Their propaganda wilts under the softest pressure. On Wednesday, Rep. Matt Gaetz went on CNN to make his case for impeaching President Joe Biden. It didn’t go so great for the Florida man. This wasn’t anchor Abby Phillip’s first rodeo with a conservative trying to defend the indefensible.

Phillip understands that if she simply asks serious questions that are based in logic, Republicans like Gaetz will flail about helplessly (and sometimes angrily). The Achilles’ heel in the Republicans’ push for an impeachment inquiry is that they have no evidence of any crimes linking President Biden with his son Hunter’s business dealings—none at all. Phillip repeatedly reminded Gaetz of this very easy-to-understand fact, and Gaetz began flailing as expected, blathering about evidence that the Republicans’ own star witness contradicted in testimony.

Acting as if he was flabbergasted with Phillip’s inability to grasp the “evidence,” Gaetz stepped over the line, and Phillip shut down this one-man dog-and-pony show:

First of all, this is not about innuendo. It's not about what I believe. It's a question: Do you have evidence? If you had evidence that Joe Biden was linked to Hunter Biden's business deals in a way that is illegal, we wouldn't be having this conversation. You would probably have the votes for an impeachment inquiry, but you don't, because of people like Ken Buck and people like Don Bacon and many others in your conference.

Enjoy!

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Sign the petition: Denounce MAGA GOP's baseless impeachment inquiry against Biden

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