Josh Fiallo
Thu, September 28, 2023
Reuters/Jonathan Ernst
Republicans’ long-shot attempt to impeach President Joe Biden got off to a rocky start Thursday, with their star witness, legal expert Jonathan Turley, outright saying he doesn’t see any evidence to support impeachment.
“I do not believe that the current evidence would support articles of impeachment,” he testified.
Turley, a Fox News legal analyst and D.C. lawyer who argued against Donald Trump’s 2019 impeachment, was called on by House Republicans to testify in the first hearing of an inquiry into whether Biden should be impeached. Republicans have been desperately searching for evidence of wrongdoing since well before Biden was elected, and the inquiry gives them the ability to obtain materials like bank records.
While he conceded there was no evidence to support impeachment, Turley did say that he believed the House had “passed the threshold” for holding an inquiry. He speculated that information could emerge if an official impeachment inquiry was launched. This, he said, should be enough for Republicans to launch an official probe.
The less-than-convincing comment was seized on by the Biden campaign, which shared a video of the quote to its social channels. And Turley’s comment clearly irked some GOP officials, one of whom reportedly told CNN that Thursday’s hearing was an “unmitigated disaster.”
“You want witnesses that make your case,” the unnamed Republican told CNN. “Picking witnesses that refute House Republicans' arguments for impeachment is mind-blowing.”
Turley wasn’t the only GOP witness to say there’s no evidence to support articles of impeachment. Bruce Dubinsky, a forensic accountant called on by Republicans, said, “I am not here today to even suggest that there was corruption, fraud, or any wrongdoing. In my opinion, more information needs to be gathered and assessed before I would make such an assessment.”
Dubinsky said there was a “smokescreen” surrounding the finances of Hunter Biden—who is not a government employee—that needed to be uncovered before an impeachment decision could be reached. Turley agreed, saying he’d vote against impeachment if it was his job to make a decision based on the evidence they have today.
Republican’s decision to call Turley as their first witness appeared to irk Steve Bannon, the ex-Trump adviser and conservative pundit, who called out House members for not vetting Turley enough. Speaking on Real America’s Voice, Bannon, citing Turley’s doubts about impeachable evidence, said “that’s maybe not a witness I call initially to lay out the case.”
“Why don’t we maybe we bring him in in a couple of weeks,” Bannon said, insinuating Republicans should have chosen someone who would have spoken harsher on Biden. “Maybe we don’t start with him. It’s just an idea.”
Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-FL) flamed House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-KY) over the apparent witness gaffe, mocking him with Bannon’s comments.
“What a day we are having here,” said a laughing Moskowitz. “I mean, listen, as a former director of emergency management, I know a disaster when I see one. I mean, if you don’t believe me, just ask Steve Bannon. Your guy just went on and said perhaps the Republicans shouldn’t have started with a witness—talking about Professor Turley—who was going to say right off the bat that there wasn’t an impeachable offense.”
Impeachment talks have swirled for nearly a year, with a cohort of Republicans centering their claims around Hunter Biden’s shady business dealings and so-far-unsubstantiated suspicions that his father engaged in corruption and abuse of public office.
Earlier this year, a former business associate of Hunter’s told House Republicans in a closed-door interview that Hunter often sold “the illusion of access to his father” and often spoke to his dad during business meetings. But Devon Archer said those conversations were about but trivial matters and he was “not aware of any” wrongdoing by the president.
Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY) tried to have that latter part of Archer’s testimony entered into the record on Thursday as proof that Biden didn’t personally meddle in, or benefit from, his son’s business dealings. But Comer, who is leading the inquiry along with Reps. Jim Jordan (R-OH) and Jason Smith (R-MO), blocked the effort.
It prompted Goldman and Comer to get into a heated argument, yelling at and interrupting each other for nearly five minutes until Comer moved on to the next line of questioning.
Even GOP Senators Are Clowning on McCarthy’s Biden Impeachment Inquiry
The testy interaction was one of many on Thursday. Rep. Lisa McClain (R-MI) and Democrats’ key witness, Michael Gerhardt, also sparred when McClain took issue with Gerhardt’s comparison of Hunter Biden’s federal gun and tax charges to that of a speeding ticket that shouldn’t involve his father.
Instead, McClain likened Hunter’s alleged crimes to that of a murder and insinuated his father could have been an accomplice—despite zero evidence.
“If a criminal pulls a trigger for a murder, he’s guilty, right?” McClain said to Gerhardt. “But don’t you also agree with me if somebody ordered that hit, we would also charge him, too?”
Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) pointed to Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, who was given a plum White House job and later made a reported $2 billion business deal with Saudi Arabia, as proof that a president’s relatives can make business deals separate from the office of the president.
“Would it be fair to attribute all of that to Donald Trump? Because it’s his son-in-law? No, not without any evidence,” Raskin said. “The principle of American law is that people are responsible for their own conduct and not the conduct of their adult children.”
Raskin grilled Republicans for concocting what he claimed is a phony inquiry based on lies peddled by Trump and Rudy Giuliani in the last election cycle.
“If Republicans had a smoking gun or even a dripping water pistol, they would be presenting it today,” he said. “They’ve got nothing on President Joe Biden. All they can do is return to the thoroughly demolished lie that Rudy Giuliani and Donald Trump launched five years ago.”
GOP’s Own Impeachment Witnesses Admit They Can’t Offer Evidence of Biden Crimes
Nikki McCann Ramirez
Thu, September 28, 2023
As a government shutdown that could affect millions of Americans looms over Congress, House Republicans are busy launching their impeachment inquiry circus against President Joe Biden.
On Thursday, the House Oversight Committee held its first hearing of their official impeachment inquiry investigation of as-yet-unproven allegations of “abuse of power, obstruction, and corruption,” by President Biden.
The GOP invited three witnesses to testify before the committee: Justice Department official Eileen O’Connor, law professor Jonathan Turley, and forensic accountant Bruce Dubinsky.
If Republicans were looking for a bombshell first hearing, they didn’t get it. All three witnesses agreed that they would not be presenting “any first-hand witness account of crimes committed by the president of the United States.”
Turley, who is also a legal analyst for Fox News, went so far as to say that despite generally supporting the inquiry, he does “not believe the current evidence would support articles of impeachment,” against the president.
Dubinsky emphasized that he was not present at the hearing “to even suggest that there was corruption, fraud, or any wrongdoing,” adding that in his opinion“more information needs to be gathered and assessed before I would make such an assessment.”
O’Connor, stated that she feels the inquiry is justified, but affirmed when asked that she was not a material witness and had no evidence to provide to the committee.
Democrats on the committee ripped the GOP in response.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) called the spectacle an “embarrassment,” and pointed to the fact that House Speaker Kevin McCarthy had circumvented a floor vote authorizing the inquiry, a vote that has typically been taken in past impeachment proceedings before moving forward with public hearings.
Ranking member Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) shared her sentiment. “They don’t have the votes because dozens of Republicans recognize what a futile and absurd process this is,” he said.
“They present us no basis [for impeachment] at all today, even after eight months of investigation. They invited three witnesses to testify today, not one of them an eyewitness to a presidential crime of any kind. Not one of them is a direct fact witness about any of the events related to Ukraine and Burisma. 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.”
Rep. Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.) sparred with Chairman Comer when he declared that “these witnesses are not giving any basis [for this hearing].” Comer disagreed, cutting Frost off, but the Democrat persisted. “These witnesses are not giving any answers,” he exclaimed. “They’re just asking more questions.”
Despite how Comer may see it, Republicans on and off the Hill are already recognizing how badly the hearing flopped. According to CNN, one GOP insider called the display an “unmitigated disaster.”
“You want witnesses that make your case. Picking witnesses that refute House Republicans’ arguments for impeachment is mind-blowing,” the anonymous source said.
Fox News, Republican’s primary propaganda outfit, tried to minimize the damage, cutting away from the proceedings and allowing anchors to inject their own spin during Democrats’ speaking time, and resuming the direct feed during Republican testimony.
Even the Biden administration signaled that they had no concerns over the proceedings. In a statement, the White House wrote that the government was hours away from shutting down “because of extreme House Republicans’ chaos and inability to govern.”
“The consequences for the American people will be very damaging — from lost jobs, to troops working without pay, to jeopardizing important efforts to fight fentanyl, deliver disaster relief, provide food assistance, and more,” the White House added. “Nothing can distract from that.”
Should House Republicans not reach a funding deal before 12:01 a.m. on Oct. 1, the government will enter a shutdown.
Rolling Stone
Dem Congresswoman: ‘Little Hands’ of Trump All Over ‘Sham Impeachment’
Thu, September 28, 2023
The House GOP’s first impeachment inquiry hearing got off to a rocky start on Thursday, as even the Republicans’ witnesses conceded there wasn’t enough evidence yet to support impeaching President Joe Biden.
Besides pointing out that Republicans had yet to provide any “smoking gun” linking the president to any criminal wrongdoing when it came to his son Hunter Biden’s business dealings, Democrats also repeatedly called out their GOP colleagues for doing the ex-president Donald Trump’s bidding with the “sham impeachment.”
And they also weren’t above doing a bit of trolling of the former president, which included bringing up the one insult that really gets under his skin.
Rep. Melanie Stansbury (D-NM) explicitly made this point during her line of questioning on Thursday afternoon. Armed with props, the lawmaker noted that the twice-impeached former president has taken to his social media accounts to demand that Republicans impeach his successor.
“We know that Donald Trump has called for this impeachment inquiry because we have the direct evidence from his own social. You can see it right here,” Stansbury exclaimed while a staffer held up a large image of a Truth Social post. “He says impeach!”
Adding that The New York Times has reported that members of the House Oversight Committee have been “directly coordinating” with Trump and “briefing” him on the inquiry, Stansbury said the ex-president has also urged them to support a government shutdown.
“We also know that if Donald Trump does not get his way, he wants his loyalists to shut down the government. How do we know that?” Stansbury declared. “Because he posted it, right here on his social media. And his loyalists in this committee, who are doing his bidding for him today, retweeted it!”
With a staffer holding up another image of Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) sharing Trump’s call for a shutdown, the congresswoman continued: “In fact, it actually says right here, the reason they want to defund the government and impeach is because this is the last chance to defund these political prosecutions against me.”
Claiming that “this is not a serious inquiry,” the New Mexico Democrat added that “the witnesses here don’t even believe there is enough evidence to impeach” before taking a personal swipe at the former president.
“We see the long arm—but little hands—of Mr. Donald Trump, whose fingerprints are all over this hearing and this sham impeachment,” she concluded. “We know that the American people are smart, they will not be fooled by what is happening here today, especially as they shut the government down in two days with catastrophic impacts for our communities.”
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