The GOP’s Hunter Biden Plans Just Blew Up
A disastrous hearing and vote on contempt of Congress, with a surprise attendance by Hunter Biden, shows the GOP still isn’t ready for prime time.
No one expected Hunter Biden to actually show up at Congress yesterday.
And hoo boy.
I usually reserve a lot of what I’m reporting on today for my weekend funnies, but given that the stakes are an impending yet evidence-free impeachment of the President, it’s important to highlight how badly the GOP is bungling the job.
The House Oversight Committee had planned to hold Hunter Biden in contempt of Congress for failing to appear for a closed door deposition. But on Wednesday, the younger Biden turned the tables on them by appearing in person anyway.
This was a gutsy and effective move for a few reasons.
First, his surprise appearance up-ended the Republicans’ plans to publicly blast him for ignoring a subpoena. Some of the GOP members, like Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC), really lost their minds over it. Any way you slice it, when Hunter Biden is sitting right there, ready and willing to testify publicly, you wind up looking pretty foolish for complaining that he ignored your subpoena.
Second, as the GOP’s prepared talking points quickly went out the window, it became clear that they weren’t at all prepared for the onslaught of criticism from a much smarter, better prepared Democratic minority on the Committee, who quickly made the hearing and vote about Republican hypocrisy on subpoena compliance.
Finally, Hunter Biden’s appearance, rather than the contempt vote, became the story of the day, stealing most if not all of the GOP’s thunder. The coup de grâce came when it was Marjorie Taylor Greene’s (Q-GA) turn to speak … and Hunter Biden nudged his attorney and they all stood up and left the room, all the press and the cameras on them, not her.
But there is more going on here than theatrics. Hunter Biden’s team and the Democrats on the Committee are deftly countering the GOP’s plan of attack and its public narrative. It’s a bit of a gamble, because it draws more attention to the Hunter Biden story. But the aggressive pushback appears to have succeeded for now in reclaiming the headlines from the GOP.
Let’s walk through what happened in a bit more detail and assess how successful it was in shifting the focus of the media.
Fool me once…
Here’s the thing. House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer (R-KY) doesn’t want Hunter Biden’s public testimony. Rather, he wants the hearing held away from the cameras and behind closed doors. That’s so he can do what Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) of the House Judiciary Committee did with his own “star witness,” Hunter Biden’s business associate Devon Archer.
After Archer testified behind closed doors, Republicans lied about his testimony so that right-wing media would take up the false narrative. By the time the transcript came out, Fox viewers were convinced that Archer had implicated President Biden in business dealings. But Archer actually had testified to the opposite, as PolitiFact reported. (If that incident felt familiar, it was precisely what Bill Barr did with the Mueller Report: take the story and put his own misleading spin on it before the actual written report comes out, then co-opt the media’s desire to be “first” to report in order to amplify the false narrative.)
Hunter Biden and his lawyer, Abbe Lowell, weren’t going to fall for that. Months ago, Lowell offered in a letter to have his client testify in public. Lowell wrote, “A public proceeding would prevent selective leaks, manipulated transcripts, doctored exhibits, or one-sided press statements.”
This letter was entirely consistent with Comer’s statement during an interview that witnesses could choose either public or private testimony. “[W]e can bring these people in for depositions or committee hearings, whichever they choose, and we can ask these questions with evidence,” Comer asserted.
Apparently, that was untrue. Comer declined Lowell’s offer of public testimony and issued a subpoena only for a closed-door hearing. But Hunter Biden refused to play along. He showed up on the day of the closed-door deposition and declared he would defy the subpoena unless he was allowed to speak publicly.
Comer then decided his committee would meet to hold Hunter Biden in contempt of Congress—even though the witness had accepted Comer’s general invitation and was prepared to testify publicly. For Comer, it was his way or no way at all.
In light of this history, it’s somewhat amusing that the GOP was caught off-guard that Hunter Biden showed up on Wednesday to attend the hearing on the contempt vote. After all, he had shown up outside the closed-door deposition to voice his protest, so why wouldn’t he be expected to do so again?
Biden’s appearance exposed the game the GOP has been playing. Practically speaking, it will now be very hard for the Justice Department to conclude that Hunter Biden acted with criminal intent in contempt of Congress when he was actually in the room, ready to speak publicly as he has always been.
Democrats take up the call
When the younger Biden made his appearance, Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-FL) understood the assignment. He pressed the point, very straightforwardly calling the GOP’s bluff:
The witness accepted the Chairman’s invitation. It just so happens, the witness is here. If the Committee wants to hear from the witness, and the Chairman gave the witness that option, then the only folks that are afraid to hear from the witness, with the American people watching, are my friends on the other side of the aisle…. Let’s vote. Let’s take a vote. Who wants to hear from Hunter, right now, today. Anyone? Come on. Who wants to hear from Hunter?
Moskowitz is very good at this, by the way. Wearing a smurf on his tie in response to Chairman Comer’s bizarre earlier criticism of his attire at an earlier hearing, Moskowitz entered into the record the January 6 Committee’s subpoenas of several GOP leaders, including Scott Perry, Mark Meadows, Jim Jordan, Mo Brooks, Andy Biggs and Kevin McCarthy, all of whom had refused to comply with them. Referencing an amendment to add those names to the Contempt Order for Hunter Biden, Moskowitz said that if the Republicans on the Committee would vote for those names and show that the process was not politically motivated and that the rules applied equally, he would vote to hold Biden in contempt, too.
Republicans of course would never agree to that.
The GOP lost their minds during the hearing
On the other side of the aisle, the response to Biden’s surprise appearance revealed how deeply weird and unstable the GOP has become. Rep. Nancy Mace, once considered a “moderate” but who really just plays for the camera, couldn’t contain her anger and frustration. But she wound up looking quite unserious, even to her own party members.
“My first question is, who bribed Hunter Biden to be here today?” she demanded. “Second question: You’re the epitome of white privilege. Coming into the Oversight Committee, spitting in our face, ignoring a congressional subpoena to be deposed. What are you afraid of? You have no balls to come up here today.”
Hearing someone like Mace attempt to co-opt (and misuse) “white privilege” was already pretty cringe. And to suggest that Biden lacked courage, even as he sat there prepared to testify publicly, badly misread the moment.
But it got worse. When Rep. Moskowitz jumped in to point out that if Mace wanted to hear from Biden, he could testify publicly, Mace tried to make this about men talking over women. “Are women allowed to speak in here or no?”
Then this: “I think that Hunter Biden should be arrested right here and right now and go straight to jail.”
Mace’s performance even displeased far-right “alpha males” like Charlie Kirk, who derided Mace for using “left-wing talking points” and a “ridiculous narrative” to lecture about “white privilege.”
Not to be outdone, Marjorie Taylor Greene grew visibly furious when he walked out of the hearing just as she began to speak. She complained that Hunter Biden “sits here with a smug look on his face and runs away when it is my turn to talk! Not only is he a criminal, but he is a coward!”
As the Washington Post reported, during her “presentation,” Greene asked to admit unverified materials into the record. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD), who is the Committee’s ranking Democrat, reminded her that she should not show pornography—a reference to Greene’s prior practice of displaying sexually explicit images of Hunter Biden during a committee hearing. When Greene claimed that the evidence was not pornography, Raskin muttered, “Well, you’re the expert”—eliciting murmurs and laughs.
Greene of course did then produce even more lewd photos, this time with Hunter Biden’s genitals blurred out, at which point Raskin and most of America watching had had it. “This is not ‘The Jerry Springer Show’! This is the United States House of Representatives!” Raskin shouted. “Come on!”
Frantic antics
The GOP had sought to shift its work and attention to Hunter Biden and impeachment in order to cover for the fact that they have accomplished next to nothing since assuming power, other than decapitating party leadership. But the Republicans’ poor performance at what should have been their moment of triumph—a vote to hold Hunter Biden in contempt—shows that they won’t have an easy time of banging on the table, either.
With the help of the witness, Democrats seized control of the hearing and the moment, just as they have with the debt ceiling deal, the budget deal, and every continuing resolution to keep the government open. It demonstrates that the Republicans cannot play what should be a winning hand. After all, Hunter Biden is not exactly a saint, having been a drug addict, a sex addict and a tax cheat. Yet somehow the Republicans are managing to make him into a victim, one whom Americans ultimately may cheer for having the “balls” to stand up to the actual witch hunt the GOP is conducting.
This isn’t going to get better for the GOP, either. After six years, this is all they have, with no evidence implicating the President but lots of nude pictures of his son, with which members like Marjorie Taylor Greene seem obsessed. Hunter Biden and House members like Moskowitz and Raskin have the right instinct to take the fight straight to the GOP and watch their plans and narratives disintegrate.
We could use a lot more of that energy as the election year heats up.
I have said it before and will say it again--Jamie Raskin and his team are masters at owning the GOP! It was all I could do not to cheer out loud at their performance. I missed the part where MTG actually brought out more porn. She really is the expert. I’m so proud to be a Democrat.
As usual, great takes. I loved the Jerry Springer reference, because that is what Republican House proceedings are.
I don't know if this was where Jasmine Crockett uttered forth her viral tirade (I use that word in a very positive sense) or not, but man, I could watch Ms. Crockett all day. She took those idiots down.