Impeachment Over Shutdown
Terry H. Schwadron
Sept. 29, 2023
Two days before their own party intransigence seems bound to close the federal government, House Republicans opened their official impeachment inquiry yesterday by sifting through a pile of unconnected suspicions that appear to fall far short of “high crimes” required to justify their apparent predetermined conclusion.
We appear to be hurtling toward furloughing hundreds of thousands of federal workers and shutting services from food inspection to closing national parks and museums, forcing the military and others to work without pay, but the order of the day was to tie up 47 lawmakers in a partly televised hearing that would not move any impeachment process even an inch forward to its inevitable defeat.
Indeed, some of the most vocal Republican attackers at the hearing are the very lawmakers who are stopping any attempt to resolve outstanding budget questions to keep government open — a basic function for people who sought election to, well, run a government.
As the hearing was going on, President Joe Biden was offering his own warnings in a visit to Arizona about the cliff facing democracy because his opponents refuse even almost four years later to recognize his legitimate election.
The events followed a televised “debate” among most of the Republican presidential candidates — omitting Donald Trump, who felt the debate would not serve his purposes, and those unable to meet eligibility — that was big on border problems but never mentioned responsibility to keep government open or the failings of education, high prices or even an intelligible sense of America’s place in the world.
High supermarket prices were presented as reason to blame Biden, and not as a problem needing resolution. And Trump himself preened in front of an invited audience that journalists showed included non-union workers parading with union signs as if it reflected autoworker support. The fact is that Shawn Fain refused to even meet Trump because of his anti-union attitudes.
Political Split Screens
Forget political loyalties, do these people have any sense about determining what is critical now versus what can be handled later? Do these politicians who insist they are reflecting what the American people want think that we are stupid?
Apparently, Republicans wanted the hearings under the auspices of three Republican-controlled committees to persuade the public and even some of their colleagues that an impeachment inquiry into President Biden holds merit.
For those who have avoided all of this, Republicans have collected various emails, notes, and testimony about Hunter Biden, the presidential son, conducting private business deals in a way that depended on political influence with his dad. Basically, the points offered have remained unconnected to the president in any meaningful way, and even the testimony of some witnesses has been equivocal about Biden’s involvement in his son’s business.
Some emails and documents reflect times a decade or more old, when Joe Biden was vice president; others were written when Biden was out of office altogether.
The witnesses at the hearing, a constitutional lawyer, a forensic accountant, and a tax lawyer, talked about process, not substance. As The Washington Post noted, this is the first impeachment inquiry to delve primarily into the behavior of a presidential relative and the first to investigate actions by the president before he entered the Oval Office.
Instead, whatever evidence was offered came from committee chairs and Republican members. As an example, Rep. James S. Comer, R-Ky., Oversight Chairman, talked about two checks mailed to Hunter Biden at the Wilmington, Del., home of Joe Biden, where Hunter was staying. The public conclusion: Joe Biden is involved somehow.
Rep. Jason Smith, R-Mo., noted that 700 documents were dumped on the committee this week, and he pulled out a single procedural email that appeared on its face to halt Hunter tax inquiries into any question involving the father. The answer was more or less the opposite, that it actually was a message about what agency should be looking into it.
In this context, Republicans were satisfied that Biden publicly and repeatedly denies involvement with his son’s business, while Hunter’s own associates have suggested that Biden met or greeted them from time to time — though not discussing their business dealings.
It remains possible that Republicans can make a case against Biden, but this hearing did not move the needle. But what remained most remarkable was its timing. Why could it not be next week — after figuring out how to keep the government functioning?
Committee hearings often can be more theater than substantive. Pushing this one as we face real problems only exaggerated the effect.
##