Category: josh hawley

Republicans rage over Hunter Biden — with some notable exceptions

Posted on (Updated by Alexander Bolton

Republican lawmakers are venting their frustration over what they say is an overly lenient plea agreement between Hunter Biden and federal prosecutors, further escalating GOP tensions with the Justice Department.   

Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) on Tuesday led the backlash from Republican lawmakers.   

“It continues to show the two-tier system in America,” McCarthy told reporters, echoing the arguments Republicans deployed after the Justice Department earlier this month unsealed a 37-count indictment against former President Trump.  

“If you are the president’s leading political opponent, the DOJ tries to literally put you in jail and give you prison time. But if you are the president’s son, you get a sweetheart deal,” McCarthy said.   

Biden agreed to plead guilty to misdemeanors for failing to pay income taxes in 2017 and 2018. He also agreed to enter a pretrial diversion program for possessing a firearm while being an unlawful user or addicted to a controlled substance.   

The plea deal, however, divided Republican leaders, just as Trump’s indictment drew mixed responses from GOP lawmakers last week.   

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) declined to comment about Biden’s legal problems as he walked to the Senate floor Tuesday afternoon.   

His opening remarks on the floor made no mention of the president’s son and focused instead on what he called “the Biden administration’s radical nominees” and Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s trip to Beijing.   

Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) also held back from lashing out at the Justice Department, pointing out that the U.S. attorney who cut the deal was a Trump appointee.   

“The justice system, I guess, has got to work its way out. He’s going to plead to a couple tax evasion charges and a gun charge. I don’t know that this is necessarily the end of the road for him, probably not. At least the preliminary stage of it is done,” Thune told reporters.  

Asked about Republican criticisms of a two-tiered system and a sweetheart deal, Thune said: “I don’t know what else they got on him, but I do think the American people have to be convinced that the justice system treats everybody equally under the law.”  

“This was a — my understanding is at least — Trump-appointed U.S. attorney. So we’ll see where it goes from here,” he added.   

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) wasn’t in the mood Tuesday to delve into the political wrangling over Hunter Biden’s plea deal.  

“I don’t have any reaction, ask me about something else,” she said. 

On the other side of the Capitol, House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) echoed McCarthy’s claim of a “two-tiered system of justice.”   

“Hunter Biden is getting away with a slap on the wrist when growing evidence uncovered by the House Oversight Committee reveals the Bidens engaged in a pattern of corruption, influence peddling, and possibly bribery,” he said.    

Republican lawmakers for months have pushed allegations based on anonymous sources that Biden received preferential treatment from the Internal Revenue Service and was involved in a bribery scheme with a Ukrainian energy company.   

But those thinly sourced claims were left unaddressed by a document outlining the plea agreement that U.S. Attorney David Weiss, a Trump appointee, filed with the U.S. district court in Wilmington, Del.  

Comer vowed to continue his investigation, pledging: “We will not rest until the full extent of President Biden’s involvement in the family’s schemes are revealed.”  

The Republican National Committee on Tuesday tweeted out a video clip of one of Hunter Biden’s attorneys telling MSNBC he didn’t remember prosecutors ever asking about Biden’s infamous laptop.   

Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), a senior member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, who has highlighted unverified allegations by an anonymous foreign national that the Bidens were involved in a bribery scheme, pointed out that Weiss, the U.S. attorney, said his investigation of Hunter Biden is ongoing.   

Asked if he expected additional charges, Grassley said: “All I know is what Weiss said, the case is still open.”   

“Today’s plea deal cannot be the final word given the significant body of evidence that the FBI and Justice Department has at its disposal. It certainly won’t be for me,” he said in a statement released earlier Tuesday.  

He said he and Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) sent material, including bank records, to the U.S. attorney, and it "doesn’t look to me like Weiss gave much credit to it with this very weak result that was announced today.”  

Johnson, who has worked closely with Grassley, said “it stinks to high heaven.”  

“The fact that they have now an IRS whistleblower coming forward and saying that the entire IRS investigatory team almost in unprecedented fashion was pulled off the case [and it] sounds like there’s allegations that they on purpose they allowed the statute of limitations to expire on more serious charges — there’s so many things that I would want investigated in terms of Hunter Biden,” he said.

Other Republican senators joined in the attacks on the Justice Department.   

Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) called the plea deal “a slap on the wrist.”   

“This doesn’t show equal justice. It’s a mockery of our legal system by a family that has no respect for our laws,” he said.  

National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman Steve Daines (R-Mont.), who has endorsed Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign, called it “nothing more than a wrist slap from his dad’s DOJ.”  

Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) called the deal “troubling.”   

Lee retweeted criticisms of the agreement circulated by Brett Tolman, the executive director of Right On Crime, a conservative advocacy group, who said pretrial diversion programs normally exclude offenses involving the brandishing a firearm.  

Many Senate and House Republicans lashed out against Attorney General Merrick Garland and special counsel Jack Smith last week after the Justice Department charged Trump with violations of the Espionage Act and conspiring to obstruct justice.  

They also argued the lack of charges against President Biden, who kept classified documents from his service in the Senate and vice president in the Obama administration, showed the federal prosecution of Trump was motivated by politics.   

“So Hunter Biden gets a special plea deal, slap on the wrist — probably won’t do a day of time — while DOJ charges Trump as a spy and tries to put him in prison forever. Two standards of ‘justice,’” Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) tweeted in response to the deal.   

One Senate Republican aide said Hunter Biden appeared to get a fairly lenient deal from the Justice Department but pointed out he cooperated with prosecutors, in contrast to Trump.

“Of course, Hunter got off easy, but he cooperated, unlike Trump,” the aide said, noting the special counsel’s indictment against the former president alleges Trump deliberately misled his lawyer about cooperating with a grand jury subpoena.   

Democrats on Tuesday argued the charges against Biden, coming just a week after the prosecutors unsealed the indictment of Trump, shows the Justice Department is applying the law fairly.   

“Neither Hunter Biden nor Donald Trump are above the law. They’re both held responsible and are going to go through the process. Joe Biden’s son just did, just completed it,” said Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin (D-Ill.). 

Emily Brooks and Al Weaver contributed.

GOP fears Trump legal woes will boomerang on them 

Posted on (Updated by Alexander Bolton

Senate Republicans are worried former President Trump’s legal troubles will create a major headwind for GOP candidates in 2024.  

They say the battle between the Justice Department and Trump, who pleaded not guilty Tuesday to charges that he violated the Espionage Act and obstructed justice with his handling of classified documents, will become a primary litmus test — just as his unsubstantiated claims that the 2020 election was stolen became a prominent point of debate in last year’s GOP primaries.  

They also worry Trump’s dominance of the media spotlight will turn off swing voters — especially suburban women — and hurt their chances of taking back the Senate or protecting their small House majority.

Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.), who has endorsed Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) for president, told reporters on Tuesday there’s “no question” the “serious” allegations against Trump will hurt the GOP if he is the nominee.  

Rounds said voters will ultimately decide whether the charges disqualify Trump from holding office, but he predicted they will create a headwind.

“Voters are going to make that determination, but most certainly for a lot of us as you look at that, it’s not going to help,” he said. “This is not good for our party, clearly not good for our party.”

Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) also warned Republicans will pay the price if Trump and his various legal battles dominate the political debate next year. 

“I think if you look at the record, in ’18, ’20, and ’22, when he’s the issue, we lose,” Thune said, referring to Republicans’ loss of the House in the 2018 midterm election, their loss of the White House and Senate in the 2020 election and Senate Republicans’ failure to take back the upper chamber in 2022.  

“I would rather have the issue be Biden and his policies. I think the way that you do that is you have a different nominee,” said Thune, who has also endorsed Scott for president.

Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.)

Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) speaks during the weekly press conference following the Republican luncheon at the Capitol on Tuesday, June 13, 2023.

Asked whether he was worried the indictment could drag down the party in 2024, Thune replied: “I’m worried obviously about the Senate races.” 

“There’s no question the political environment affects that, and the top of the ticket is part of the political environment,” he said.  

Thune acknowledged the legal battle could help Trump in a primary, but he argued it would hurt the GOP at large in a general election.

“Everybody says, ‘Well, it gives him a political bump,’ and all that, and that may be true with the political base but, again, the people who decide national elections are the middle of the electorate. It’s the soccer moms, it’s the suburban voters, it’s younger voters, and I just think we’ve got a candidate who can appeal to those,” he said.  

“A lot of the drama and the chaos that seems to be happening with an ongoing basis [with Trump] makes it harder to win those types of voters,” Thune observed.

More Senate coverage from The Hill

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) told reporters after last year’s disappointing midterm election that the “chaos” and “negativity” surrounding Trump hurt Senate GOP candidates, though he didn’t mention Trump by name.

On Tuesday, however, McConnell declined to go anywhere near Trump’s legal troubles when asked whether he would support the former president if he wins the party’s nomination. 

“I’m just simply not going to comment on the candidates,” he said when asked about supporting Trump, noting the Republican presidential primary has been playing out for the past six months and will last for another year. 

Asked about the indictment itself and whether Trump did anything wrong, McConnell replied: “I’m not going to start commenting on the various candidates we have running for president. There are a lot of them; it’s going to be interesting to watch.” 

McConnell’s caution reflects in part the fact many GOP senators and Senate Republican candidates remain ardent fans of the former president.  

Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) missed an important vote Tuesday on Biden’s nominee to serve as chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers; he was headed to Trump’s New Jersey golf club to attend a Trump rally.

Also on Tuesday, first-term Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio) announced he would put a hold on Biden’s nominees to the Justice Department to protest the federal prosecution of Trump.  

“If Merrick Garland wants to use these officials to harass Joe Biden’s political opponents, we will grind his department to a halt,” Vance said in a statement. 

Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio)

Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) asks questions during a Senate Banking Committee hearing on Tuesday, May 16, 2023 to discuss the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank in March.

Vance’s hold will require Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) to go through the time-consuming process of scheduling votes on individual nominees.

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) told reporters Tuesday that the Justice Department’s indictment will have a “galvanizing effect” on Republican voters and predicted Trump, who has a big lead in national and key primary state polls, will be the party’s nominee.  

“I think voters see [the indictment] for what it is. It is politically motivated, clearly,” he said.

He noted that Trump has already faced two impeachment trials and multiple accusations over the years, including his recent indictment on 34 felony charges by the Manhattan district attorney and a jury’s decision to award author E. Jean Carroll $5 million in damages after finding the former president liable for sexual abuse and defamation.  

“There’s always a lot of a lot around President Trump,” he said.  

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He disagreed with Senate Republican colleagues who blame Trump for the failure to win back the majority last year.  

“If Senate Republicans want to blame somebody for that, we should go get a mirror,” he said.

A June 7-10 CBS/YouGov poll of 2,480 adults showed Trump leading his nearest rival, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, by 38 percentage points. The survey recontacted 1,798 respondents after the federal indictment was unsealed. 

Senate GOP leaders break with House on Trump indictment  

Posted on (Updated by Alexander Bolton

Editor's note: This report has been updated to clarify that the indictment accuses former President Trump of showing a classified document about attacking Iran to a writer without security clearance.

Senate Republican leaders, including Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), are staying quiet about former President Trump’s indictment on 37 criminal charges, letting him twist in the wind and breaking with House Republican leaders who have rushed to Trump’s defense.   

McConnell, who is careful not to comment on Trump or even repeat his name in public, has said to his GOP colleagues that he wants his party to turn the page on the former president, whom he sees as a flawed general election candidate and a drag on Senate Republican candidates.    

The Senate GOP leader’s top deputies — Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) and Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) — have also indicated they don’t want Trump to win the party’s 2024 presidential nomination.   

They, along with McConnell, are letting Trump’s legal troubles unfold without coming to the former president’s defense, in contrast to Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.), who both issued statements Thursday criticizing the Justice Department before the indictment was unsealed to the public.   

“They want him to go away, so they wouldn’t be very upset if this is the thing that finally takes him out,” a former Senate Republican aide said about the Senate Republican leaders’ silence on Trump’s indictment.  

Republican senators were more outspoken in defending Trump in April, after liberal Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg unveiled an indictment charging him with 34 felony counts related to business records fraud.   

Even Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) declined to express confidence in Bragg when asked about him in late March.  

Special prosecutor Jack Smith, whom Attorney General Merrick Garland tapped in November to investigate Trump, has more credibility among Republicans.   

“Jack Smith is very credible,” said the former Senate GOP aide.  

“There is the reflection that he may have actually found finally the silver bullet” to end Trump’s political career, the former aide said, noting that Smith has a tape of Trump acknowledging that he had retained classified documents after leaving office that he didn’t declassify while president.   

A Senate Republican aide said the indictment is “pretty damning.”  

“The documents that he did have, and who he was showing them to and where he was storing them, is all pretty damning,” the aide said. “I don’t know if it will make a difference in the political landscape, but it certainly seems pretty bad.”  

The indictment accuses Trump of showing a classified document laying out the military strategy for an attack against Iran to a writer who didn’t have security clearance.   

The former president also showed a sensitive military map to a staffer for his political action committee.  

Photos included in the indictment showed that Trump haphazardly stashed boxes of sensitive materials around his residence at the Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, including in a ballroom, a bathroom, a shower, office space and his bedroom.  

One photo showed documents scattered across the floor of a storage room.   

Nevertheless, House Republican leaders are speaking out forcefully against the indictment.   

“This is going to disrupt the nation because it goes to the core of equal justice for all, which is not being seen today. And we’re not going to stand for it,” McCarthy told Fox News in an interview Friday.  

Scalise tweeted Thursday evening “this sham indictment is the continuation of the endless political persecution of Donald Trump.”  

Former Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.), a one-time advisor to McConnell’s leadership team and whose home state will host the second contest of next year’s Republican presidential primary, said the Department of Justice’s indictment may prove too much for Trump to overcome.  

“At some point there’s a straw that breaks the camel’s back, and there’s a whole lot of straws on the back of Donald Trump right now,” he said.  

Gregg called the legal problems facing Trump clearly “outside the norm for a major leader of our nation.”  

A New York jury last month found Trump liable for sexual abuse and awarded his accuser, the writer E. Jean Carroll, a $5 million judgment.   

“Most Republicans want somebody else, even Trump people want somebody else, because they want to win and they recognize Trump is incapable of winning a general election at this point,” Gregg said.   

He said Senate Republican leaders should call on the GOP to move past the former president.  

“I would be advising them to say, ‘Listen, we have to move on as a party. Let Donald Trump work through his legal issues, which are considerable, but we as a party need to move on, and let’s find ourselves a candidate for president who can win,’” he said.  

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) on Friday evening said the charges brought by the Department of Justice are “quite serious and cannot be casually dismissed.”

She said in a statement that “mishandling classified documents is a federal crime because it can expose national secrets, as well as the sources and methods they were obtained through.”

Murkowski, who voted to convict Trump on the impeachment charge of inciting the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, joined fellow Republican Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) in being the only two Republican senators to criticize Trump shortly after the indictment became public.

Romney, who voted twice to convict Trump on impeachment charges in 2020 and 2021, defended the Justice Department from criticisms voiced by other Republicans that it is acting unfairly.

“By all appearances, the Justice Department and special counsel have exercised due care, affording Mr. Trump the time and opportunity to avoid charges that would not generally have been afforded to others,” Romney said in a statement.  

“Mr. Trump brought these charges upon himself by not only taking classified documents, but by refusing to simply return them when given numerous opportunities to do so,” he said.   

Senate conservatives have come to Trump’s defense, notably Sens. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Mike Lee (R-Utah).   

“The Biden administration’s actions can only be compared to the type of oppressive tactics routinely seen in nations such as Venezuela, Bolivia and Nicaragua, which are absolutely alien and unacceptable in America,” Lee said in a statement. “It is an affront to our country’s glorious 246-year legacy of independence from tyranny, for the incumbent president of the United States to leverage the machinery of justice against a political rival.”   

Cruz, speaking on his "The Verdict" podcast, called the indictment “an assault on democracy,” “garbage” and “a political attack from a thoroughly corrupted and weaponized Department of Justice.”  

Senate Republican Conference Chairman John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), the third-ranking member of the Senate GOP leadership, who voted against the debt deal and is seen within the Senate GOP conference as someone who has tried to ally himself with its most conservative members, also criticized the indictment.   

“This indictment certainly looks like an unequal application of justice,” he said in a statement, pointing out that “large amounts of classified materials were found in President Biden’s garage in Delaware” yet “no indictment.”   

Yet many other Republican senators, particularly those more closely allied with McConnell, are staying conspicuously quiet about Trump’s legal travails.  

One GOP senator who requested anonymity defended the Justice Department, pushing back on accusations that because Garland is a Biden appointee, the prosecution is necessarily motivated by politics.   

“Where do you draw the line?” the senator said. “Everybody owes their job to someone.  

“We have to trust our institutions, and there’s not a lot of trust right now,” the senator added.  

Updated at 10:47 a.m. EDT.

Sen. Hawley Introduces Bill To Allow States To Deport Illegal Immigrants

Posted on by Becky Noble

Already this fiscal year, the U.S. has seen record-breaking numbers of illegal immigrants crossing the border. So far, over 2.1 million encounters with one month to go.

We’ve seen border states attempt to shame the Biden administration into doing something about it by sending illegal immigrants to northern, liberal areas.

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) has another idea. He’s introducing a bill that would allow individual states to enforce federal immigration laws, and deport illegal immigrants.

RELATED: Top Dem Nadler Knew Trump Impeachment Process Was ‘Unconstitutional’ But Schiff And Pelosi Dismissed Him

Granting More Power To States

Hawley’s bill, the “Empowering States to Deport Illegal Immigrants Act,” would:

  • Let state prosecutors bring charges for immigration violations
  • Allow states to deport illegal immigrants
  • Allow border states more leeway in actually closing their borders with Mexico

Conservatives have been pushing for such changes for some time.

During a recent appearance on the Fox News Channel with host Laura Ingraham, Hawley talked about the legislation and said:

“If Joe Biden isn’t going to enforce immigration laws why don’t we let the states enforce immigration laws? The State of Texas would love to, the states of Florida, Arizona, they’d love to enforce immigration laws. Let them do it, let’s let them secure the border, let’s let them deport illegal immigrants according to our laws. Let’s take the gloves off here, let’s enforce the law, let’s restore order to the border.”

RELATED: Thousands Of VA Students Protest Policy Requiring Boys To Use Boy’s Bathroom

Taking Matters Into Their Own Hands

While the Biden administration continues to insist that the southern border is “closed,” governors like Greg Abbott in Texas and Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey have begun taking matters into their own hands.

Back in July, both Abbott and Ducey began transporting busloads of illegal immigrants to self-declared “sanctuary cities” like New York City and Washington D.C. It didn’t take long for the whining from sanctuary city mayors to begin.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams begged the federal government for help as the city’s homeless shelters were being overrun. Washington D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser asked the federal government to deploy National Guard troops to her city, and claimed that immigrants were somehow being “tricked” into getting on busses headed for New York and Washington D.C. 

While calling for National Guard troops, Bowser also added that “local taxpayers are not picking up the tab.”

But perhaps the best illustration of how sanctuary cities don’t really mean sanctuary, is of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis sending two planeloads of illegal immigrants to Martha’s Vineyard.

Left-wing pundits accused DeSantis of “human trafficking,” and it sent the residents of the tony liberal enclave into a tizzy, declaring they had no way to house and feed just 50 migrants. In less than 48 hours, Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker had activated 125 National Guard troops and the migrants were deported off the island to nearby Joint Base Cape Cod.

RELATED: Trump Has Seen Enough: Offers To Negotiate Peace Deal Between Russia, Ukraine

No End In Sight

As Americans listen to Biden administration officials repeatedly tell them that the border is closed and secure, The Political Insider’s own Kat Anderson recently looked at the numbers. The results are pretty alarming.

In August, Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) reported 203,598 “encounters” with migrants at the border. That we know of, because there is no way to track how many “gotaways” avoided Border Patrol Agents and entered the country.

With one month left in Fiscal Year 2022, the total number of encounters is a staggering 2,150,370. The total for Fiscal Year 2021 was 1.7 million, marking an increase of 450,000 this year. Getting a bit anxious yet?

More people have crossed illegally into the United States than the populations of both Chicago and Houston. It is more than the population of 15 states combined. And what should really send a collective chill down the collective American spine, it is more than the total number of active military personnel in Russia, China, and the U.S.

If Josh Hawley’s bill becomes law, border states will truly be the front line against what some in those states are rightly calling an invasion.

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Ana Navarro Says Republican Senators Who Acquit Trump ‘Like Cult Members’ Will ‘Be Maligned By History’

Posted on by LifeZette

On Friday’s episode of “The View,” cohost Ana Navarro unravelled as she nonsensically claimed that Republican senators who voted to acquit former President Donald Trump in his second impeachment trial “are going to be maligned in history.”

Apparently Navarro has a crystal ball, because she thinks she can see the future.

Navarro Speaks Out

“Then we heard that there’s three of them, Cruz, Hawley and Lindsey Graham, meeting with the defense lawyers,” she said.

“That’s not what an impartial juror is supposed to do. I was so shaken by the videos, and I just can’t explain to myself how somebody, you know, if it shakes us watching it, how somebody who actually lived through that could then go back just a few hours later that same day and vote to continue confirming Trump’s lies, as 150 Republicans between the House and the Senate did that same day, you know, that evening of January 6th,” Navarro continued.

“What we’re talking about here is we’re not talking about removing him,” she added. “We’re not talking about sending Trump to jail. We’re not talking about taking away his property. This trial is about setting the record of history straight and setting a precedent, and making sure that this does not happen again.”

Related: Ana Navarro Claims McCarthy’s Mar-a-Lago Trip Was ‘White Slavery’ – Says He’s Owned By His Master, Trump

Navarro Doubles Down

“So if they lived through what we just saw, if they just saw how close they came to being, you know, harmed, to being actually harmed, we saw them running, we saw them running in fear, these senators, and they’re still going to go and act like cult members and not vote to set the record straight for history?” Navarro continued.

“They are going to be maligned in history. We will be studying this for decades, and people are going to know that they are cowards, cowards, cowards,” she concluded. 

Related: Donald Trump Meets With Kevin McCarthy At Mar-A-Lago To Plan 2022 Republican House Takeover 

Navarro is a woman who claims to be a former Republican, despite seemingly to never say anything that sounds like it comes from anyone who was ever a conservative in their life.

She’s made a living off of insulting Trump for the last four years, and judging by her comments today, she has no intention of stopping anytime soon.

This piece was written by James Samson on February 12, 2021. It originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.

Read more at LifeZette:
Lindsey Graham Predicts ‘Not Guilty’ Impeachment Votes Are Growing After ‘Absurd’ Arguments From Democrats
Gowdy Takes On House Impeachment Managers, Trump Livid
James Clyburn Issues Brutal Warning To Trump – ‘This Is Just The Beginning’

The post Ana Navarro Says Republican Senators Who Acquit Trump ‘Like Cult Members’ Will ‘Be Maligned By History’ appeared first on The Political Insider.

MSNBC’s Joy Reid Says Cruz And Hawley’s Families Should Be ‘Ashamed’ Of Them

Posted on by LifeZette

MSNBC host Joy Reid went after Senators Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Josh Hawley (R-MI) on Wednesday, going so far as to say that their families should be “ashamed” of the role she claims they plaid in the Capitol riots.

Reid Attacks Cruz And Hawley

“If I were the families of Josh Hawley who unfortunately replaced Claire McCaskill in the United States Senate and Ted Cruz, I’d be ashamed because they were a part of it,” she said, referring to the Capitol riots.

“Josh Hawley was giving the high fist to those murderers, those cop killers. Ted Cruz, they’re in the gallery saying, oh, Ted Cruz is with us,” Reid added. 

“They’re accessories to the murders, to the mayhem, to the hunting of the vice president of the United States, and by the way, where is the vice president of the United States? You’ve been asking that, Nicolle,” she said to her colleague Nicole Wallace.

“He was literally hunted like an animal. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen anything like this in terms of Senate testimony ever,” she said.

Related: MSNBC’s Joy Reid Claims Capitol Police Went Easy On ‘White’ Protesters, Ignores Woman Killed

“I don’t know how any of them can sleep at night and face their families and their children and explain after what has basically been a truth, not the reconciliation part, but a truth commission,” Reid continued.

“You know, I doubt that Donald Trump will be convicted. They’ll find a way to tuck their shame away and pretend that this is okay, but we now know,” Reid concluded. “We know. We have seen it viscerally. We have heard the police calling on the radio calling for help.”

Cruz And Hawley Condemn Capitol Riots

It should be noted that both Cruz and Hawley have repeatedly condemned the Capitol riots over the past few weeks.

“We saw a terrorist attack on the United States Capitol,” Cruz said on January 7. “Everyone who attacked the Capitol should be fully prosecuted and they should spend a long, long time in jail.”

“You’re not going to get anything but condemnation from me for what happened with those criminals at the Capitol on Jan. 6, but that doesn’t make the trial any more legitimate than it is, which is totally illegitimate — no basis in the Constitution,” Hawley said on Thursday, according to Politico.

Related: Josh Hawley Rips Democrats – ‘Total Lie’ That I Tried To Overturn Presidential Election

“What we’re seeing is what we lived through. It’s what my staff lived through,” Hawley added. “The criminals who did it ought to be prosecuted as they are being and ought to be given the full measure of the law.”

This piece was written by James Samson on February 11, 2021. It originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.

Read more at LifeZette:
Jim Jordan Claims Democrats Are ‘Scared’ Of Trump
Gowdy Takes On House Impeachment Managers, Trump Livid
Conservative Reactions To First Day Of Senate Impeachment Trial

The post MSNBC’s Joy Reid Says Cruz And Hawley’s Families Should Be ‘Ashamed’ Of Them appeared first on The Political Insider.

Major Corporations Will Halt Donations To Republican Lawmakers Who Argued For Election Integrity

Posted on by Rusty Weiss

Three major corporations are reportedly halting donations to Republican lawmakers who argued for election integrity and adherence to the Constitution.

Popular Information reports that the corporations are citing last week’s riot at the Capitol, and alleging Republican lawmakers “encouraged the rioters by objecting to the certification of the Electoral College vote.”

The outlet contacted corporations who donated to Republicans in the past and asked if they would continue to do so.

Out of 144 companies contacted, Popular Information received a commitment from three to no longer donate to anybody who objected to the election results.

The three corporations are:

  • Blue Cross Blue Shield Association.
  • Marriott International.
  • Commerce Bancshares.

No word on whether or not the same outlet contacted corporations who donated to Democrats who, over the summer, helped bail out arsonists and looters.

RELATED: GOP Sen. Ben Sasse Will Consider Impeachment, Ilhan Omar Predicts President Trump WILL Be Removed

Corporations Pulling Donations From Republican Lawmakers

Bloomberg News reports that several other companies are pausing political donations in the wake of Wednesday’s Capitol protests.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Citigroup Inc., Morgan Stanley, and JPMorgan Chase & Co. “plan to pause all political contributions,” they write.

In a memo to employees, Citigroup said: “We want you to be assured that we will not support candidates who do not respect the rule of law.”

In a sane world, that would mean every single Democrat who supported race riots over the summer, or who supported the soft coup by the Obama administration against President Trump, would lose support.

But we no longer live in a sane world.

No, many companies whose businesses or locations actually suffered at the hands of Democrat-fueled riots over the summer – riots that took place over many months – will now take action against Republicans because of one protest that got out of control.

RELATED: Federal Prosecutor Could Bring Criminal Charges Against President Trump For Capitol Violence

The Purge of Conservative Thought Continues

Of all of the efforts to stifle conservative thought taking place in America today, this one might hurt the most as it has monetary implications for lawmakers who actually care about voter fraud and other conservative platforms and principles.

Big Tech is purging conservatives from their social media platforms by the thousands. The President is being threatened with impeachment. Republican congressmen are being threatened with expulsion.

And now, donations to the politicians who support conservative principles plan to tighten their purse strings.

This is all part of what ABC News accidentally admitted is an effort at “cleansing the movement” of those who support the President.

It’s amazing how bad things have gotten in the span of a few days. But all of these efforts to stifle political opposition have been ongoing for years. Democrats and the media just needed a spark to start a full-on assault of free speech.

If Republicans don’t find another means to stop this process of ‘cleansing’ conservative thought from America there may not be an America much longer.

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Senator Hawley Preparing Motions to Subpoena Schiff, Bidens, Whistleblower in Impeachment Trial

Posted on by Rusty Weiss

Senator Josh Hawley revealed he plans to draft motions to subpoena House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, presidential candidate Joe Biden and his son Hunter, and the alleged ‘whistleblower.’

The move would be especially urgent due to new revelations that moderate Republican senators are threatening to join Democrats in their call for new witnesses in the impeachment trial.

“If the witness vote succeeds, Hawley aims to force votes on subpoenas for House Intelligence Chairman Schiff (D-Calif.), Vice President Biden, Hunter Biden, Intelligence Community Inspector General Michael Atkinson, the still-unnamed whistleblower,” Politico reported over the weekend.

“If the Senate calls witnesses, I will ask for votes on all these next week,” Hawley tweeted.

RELATED: Romney Says He’s ‘Very Likely’ to Join Democrats on Call For New Impeachment Witnesses

An Urgent Move

Hawley’s proposal is pivotal considering a New York Times report on suspiciously leaked manuscript details involving a book from former National Security Advisor John Bolton.

The report – from anonymous sources – indicates that Bolton accuses President Trump of withholding military aid to Ukraine until Joe Biden and his son Hunter were properly investigated.

While the media hit job smacks of a replay of that carried out against Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, it is enough to cause weak-kneed senators to crumble and attempt to completely re-litigate the impeachment articles in the Senate.

Senator Mitt Romney (R-UT) has admitted, “I think it’s very likely I’ll be in favor of witnesses.”

Susan Collins, Senator from Maine, and Lisa Murkowski, Senator from Alaska, are also reportedly flaking. Meaning Democrats would need just one other Republican colleague to tuck their tail between their legs and join them in the impeachment hit job.

Should they succeed, Hawley’s measure would present the impeachment managers with a difficult double-edged sword, raising the specter that Schiff, Biden and the whistleblower could all be called to testify.

RELATED: Report: GOP Adding a ‘Kill Switch’ Option to Prevent Democrats From Turning Impeachment Into Circus

Activate the Kill Switch

Last week, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell finalized rules for the impeachment trial, adding what some defined as a ‘kill switch’ in which the President’s legal team could either move to judgment or move to dismiss at a meaningful time.

The House failed to do their homework and call Bolton to testify in the first place. Bolton’s claims in a book he is setting up for online pre-order contradict the reality behind the transcripts of the telephone call. So, they’re not a game-changer by any stretch. That said, perhaps it’s time to implement the ‘kill switch.’

Seeing Schiff, the Biden’s, and the whistleblower dragged in to testify would be an interesting prospect sure, but the longer this gets dragged out, the longer Democrats and the media will have to continually manufacture new evidence – just as they did with Kavanaugh.

It’s time to stop the madness.

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