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Republicans Trip Over Their Own Assholes Trying to Take Down Hunter Biden
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2023/11/hunter-biden-house-oversight-subpoena. . .
On Tuesday, the president’s son said that he will comply with a subpoena for testimony from the House Oversight and Accountability Committee—but only in public. In a letter to Congress, Hunter Biden’s lawyer, noting that the committee has used “closed-door sessions to manipulate, even distort the facts and misinform the public,” proposed a public hearing on December 13, the very day the GOP had set for Biden’s closed-door interview. “If, as you claim, your efforts are important and involve issues that Americans should know about, then let the light shine on these proceedings,” he wrote. The response from committee chair James Comer? Absolutely not; these proceedings must take place in private.
In a statement, Comer wrote, “Hunter Biden is trying to play by his own rules instead of following the rules required of everyone else. That won’t stand with House Republicans.” (Naturally, he did not mention that “House Republicans” regularly defy subpoenas.) Later, appearing on Newsmax, Comer explained that Biden simply must testify privately because, otherwise, Democrats will interrupt him and his fellow Republican colleagues with fact-checks. Comer unpersuasively argued: “As these hearings go, you got 20 members on each side that have five minutes each. We have tens of thousands of pages of documents where we need to sit down and ask specific substantive questions without filibustering, without interruption, without going five minutes back and forth with Jamie Raskin and Dan Goldman and little [Jared] Moskowitz jumping up and down, filing motions, and trying to disrupt the committee hearings.”
. . .
“Let me get this straight,” Raskin wrote. “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 [James Comer (R-Ky.)] 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?” He added: “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.”
Also calling out the absurdity of the situation was Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who wrote on X: “The reason GOP don’t want a public hearing on Hunter Biden is because @OversightDems have hoisted them by their own petards in every public hearing this year. They’re scared of getting humiliated for not having an actual case (again), so they need to hide.”
On Tuesday, the president’s son said that he will comply with a subpoena for testimony from the House Oversight and Accountability Committee—but only in public. In a letter to Congress, Hunter Biden’s lawyer, noting that the committee has used “closed-door sessions to manipulate, even distort the facts and misinform the public,” proposed a public hearing on December 13, the very day the GOP had set for Biden’s closed-door interview. “If, as you claim, your efforts are important and involve issues that Americans should know about, then let the light shine on these proceedings,” he wrote. The response from committee chair James Comer? Absolutely not; these proceedings must take place in private.
In a statement, Comer wrote, “Hunter Biden is trying to play by his own rules instead of following the rules required of everyone else. That won’t stand with House Republicans.” (Naturally, he did not mention that “House Republicans” regularly defy subpoenas.) Later, appearing on Newsmax, Comer explained that Biden simply must testify privately because, otherwise, Democrats will interrupt him and his fellow Republican colleagues with fact-checks. Comer unpersuasively argued: “As these hearings go, you got 20 members on each side that have five minutes each. We have tens of thousands of pages of documents where we need to sit down and ask specific substantive questions without filibustering, without interruption, without going five minutes back and forth with Jamie Raskin and Dan Goldman and little [Jared] Moskowitz jumping up and down, filing motions, and trying to disrupt the committee hearings.”
. . .
“Let me get this straight,” Raskin wrote. “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 [James Comer (R-Ky.)] 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?” He added: “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.”
Also calling out the absurdity of the situation was Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who wrote on X: “The reason GOP don’t want a public hearing on Hunter Biden is because @OversightDems have hoisted them by their own petards in every public hearing this year. They’re scared of getting humiliated for not having an actual case (again), so they need to hide.”
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