You have to hand it to Hunter Biden. He has been beating MAGA Congressional Republicans at his own game.
The Republican Party is desperate to find any kind of evidence that President Biden has improperly benefited from his son's foreign business dealings. So far, the search and his impeachment investigation have turned up nothing. But House Republicans won't give up. In fact, their behavior reminds me of the old joke about the room full of horse manure: they just know there's a pony in there. in some place.
opinion columnist
Robin Abcarian
Hunter Biden has repeatedly said he would testify in his bogus investigation. But he wanted to do it in public, not behind closed doors. He's not good enough, said Trump's sycophants, who want to interrogate him in secret. Why would closed-door testimony benefit Republicans?
“Let me tell you why no one wants to talk to you behind closed doors,” he explained. Texas Democratic Representative Jasmine Crockett to his Republican colleagues on the House Oversight Committee before they voted Wednesday to recommend that the full House hold Biden in contempt. “Because you all lie.” (He meant that partisans would selectively leak secret testimony damaging to the Bidens. Republicans have said, and not without basis, that an open hearing would devolve into partisan bickering and posturing.)
To the committee's surprise, Biden showed up to Wednesday's hearing, sitting in the front row. But not by much.
To his credit, when it was MAGA Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene's turn to speak, Biden did the most dismissive thing possible: He abruptly stood up and walked out of the room.
“Wow, that's too bad,” Greene said disappointedly. “I think it's clear that Hunter Biden is terrified of strong conservative women. What a coward”.
Aaron Rupar, the Washington journalist who covered the hearing in X, posted a screenshot from the faux Fox News chyron: “Hunter flees courtroom as GOP questions.”
Leaving was not an act of cowardice, said Democratic Rep. Robert Garcia of California. After all, he said, Greene” is the one who showed naked photos of Hunter Biden. Showing dick pics in this committee room! (At a hearing last summer, Greene showed photos of Biden that had been stolen from his famous laptop.) Undeterred, Greene did it again on Wednesday, exploiting Biden when he was in the grips of addiction and despair over the death of his brother. Prince. Why should Hunter Biden stand by in the face of Greene's transparent attempt to humiliate him?
“There are members of this committee who have engaged in revenge porn,” said Democratic U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.. MAGA Republican Rep. Nancy Mace had already adopted a strange, lewd tone, telling Biden: “You are the epitome of white privilege…. What are you afraid of? “You don't have balls.”
Between Greene's fatuous display, Mace's criticism, and, sorry, but I have to mention this, Colorado MAGA representative Lauren Boebert's unseemly boyfriend groping in a Denver theater in September, one really has to wonder about the obsession MAGA Republican women have with male anatomy.
To MAGA Republicans trying to unseat his father, Hunter Biden is much more than a troubled son who has taken advantage of the family name. He is their chance to keep scandal-free Biden in the news. If they can generate negative-sounding headlines about Hunter, maybe some of the stench will rub off on his father.
“I think what they're doing to Hunter is cruel,” Jill Biden told MSNBC host Mika Brzezinksi on Thursday.
It is, but to his credit, Hunter Biden refuses to let them do it without a fight. He has a loyal and deep-pocketed friend in Hollywood entertainment lawyer Kevin Morris, who has been by his side since 2019 and lent him money to pay his back taxes, and a smart, aggressive new defense attorney in the Washington fixture. , Abbe Lowell.
In a surprise move on Friday, Lowell told the chairmen of the two House committees seeking Biden's testimony that his client would appear behind closed doors if they issued new subpoenas. My guess is that Biden relented rather than risk a House vote to refer the contempt charges to the Justice Department, which could further exacerbate his legal problems. In any case, he had already made his point clear. Republicans, for their part, said they would file contempt charges anyway.
However, with the help of his father's Democratic allies in Congress, Hunter Biden has managed to rub MAGA Republicans' faces in the face of their own hypocrisy.
Congressional Trumpists have refused to hold contempt against their own colleagues who have rejected legal subpoenas. The double standard is as predictable as it is shoddy.
Democratic Representative Jared Moskowitz recited a complete list of them on Wednesday: Republican Reps. Scott Perry, Jim Jordan, Mo Brooks, Andy Biggs and former Republican Speaker Kevin McCarthy, all of whom rejected subpoenas to testify in the Congressional investigation into the Jan. 6 insurrection. “Show the American people that we apply the law equally,” Moskowitz said. “If you hold them in contempt, I will vote to hold Hunter Biden in contempt.” (In the end, no Democrats voted to send the contempt resolution to the House floor.)
On Thursday, Hunter Biden was in federal court in Los Angeles and pleaded not guilty to the tax charges. The case against him, which arose after a plea deal failed, is serious, but he has already recovered the government, paying the taxes he owed, plus fines and interest.
As for MAGA-led committees hoping to use the son to impeach the father? They can sift through all the Biden dirt, uh, they want, but they'll never find a pony in there.
