Biden impeachment inquiry would not be needed if DOJ 'did their job,' analysts say
During the hearing, Maryland Congressmen Kweisi Mfume and Jamie Raskin called for ex-Mayor Rudy Giuliani to also testify
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The House Republicans' impeachment inquiry into President Biden, alleging illicit influence peddling and bribery, would have been wholly unnecessary if the Justice Department did their job and thoroughly investigated the first family, legal analysts said Thursday.
Former deputy independent counsel Solomon Wisenberg, who helped investigate the Clintons' Whitewater land-deal probe centered in Arkansas that eventually led to the Monica Lewinsky scandal, said a substantive Justice Department investigation into allegations against Hunter Biden that may tie-in his father would've supplanted the need for House Republicans to act on their own.
"Obviously, you have we're all familiar with the email where somebody mentioned 5% or 10% for ‘The Big Guy’ – right. And [Tony] Bobulinski has said that that person is [Joe] Biden," Wisenberg said, referring to a former business partner of Hunter Biden who spoke out on FOX News and attended one of the 2020 presidential debates.
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"Now, you know that, actually, conceivably, in some settings could be evidence," Wisenberg said Thursday on "Your World." "It could be a co-conspirator statement. So, yes, you're looking at the possibility whether or not you should bring articles of impeachment against Joe Biden. But people are usually smart enough to cover their tracks about what they do"
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However, Wisenberg said all of these corroborating witnesses and documents that the House Oversight and Ways and Means Committees have obtained would not be as pertinent if the feds probed more substantively themselves.
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"You wouldn't have this need to get this kind of evidence if the U.S. attorney's office and the Department of Justice had had done their job, the stuff that we saw coming out yesterday and that we've seen coming out shows they didn't want any kind of inquiry of Joe Biden. And that is that's a sad state of affairs," Wisenberg concluded.
Former George W. Bush Justice Department official John Yoo said Democrats repeatedly clamoring for more witnesses and the introduction of "fact witnesses" during Thursday's hearing may just get their wish, but to their own chagrin.
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Democrats including Baltimore Congressman Kweisi Mfume offered impassioned statements demanding former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani be called, with some citing his connection to Ukrainian-American businessman Lev Parnas – a figure who was sentenced to more than a year in prison on campaign finance and wire fraud violations.
"Why in the hell are we playing this game?" Mfume asked during the hearing while holding up a "WHERE IS RUDY?" sign. "[W]here is Rudy Giuliani right now? I’d like to know, and I’d like to know why we can’t bring him before this committee, like we brought these witnesses…"
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Mfume's colleague, ranking member Jamie Raskin, D-Md., made a motion to subpoena Giuliani and Parnas, which Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., immediately and successfully roll-called to table.
Yoo said more witnesses are likely, but did not mention any individual specifically.
"The Democrats kept complaining: ‘We want to see more facts. We want to see more witnesses.’ Unfortunately, I think for their perspective, they're going to get their wish because that's going to be what's going to happen in the next few hearings," he said.
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Yoo told "Your World" the hearing was "mischaracterized" in that he did not see substantive new evidence, but credited Republicans with laying out the constitutional basis for which the inquiry into Biden was launched.
He said the ability to impeach a president for actions stemming from prior to his election is unclear, which adds importance to the task of linking Biden to current offenses such as alleged obstruction.
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