New plans? How Trump loyalists are out for Biden family blood more than ever | Opinion

WASHINGTON — House Republicans’ impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden all but unraveled, but you wouldn’t know that from talking to House Republicans this week.

They’re out for Biden family blood more than ever.

The GOP’s cheering of a damning verdict for presidential son Hunter Biden — found guilty of lying on a federal firearm form and illegally owning a gun — have proven short-lived.

On Capitol Hill, the mood amongst Republicans is mostly anger as the party overflows with complaints about “a two-tiered” system of justice — even after the president’s son was successfully prosecuted by the same Department of Justice they decry for its pursuit of former President Donald Trump.

“No one's taking it seriously, because the Department of Justice, if they were actually a real justice system, they would have charged him for FARA [Foreign Agents Registration Act]. They would be charging him for human sex trafficking,” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) told Raw Story while walking to the Capitol to vote Wednesday.

MTG’s far from alone.

On Wednesday, three powerful Republican committee chairs sent the Department of Justice criminal referrals for Hunter and James Biden, the president’s brother.

The two Bidens made false statements to their committees that "implicate Joe Biden’s knowledge and role in his family’s influence peddling schemes and appear to be a calculated effort to shield Joe Biden from the impeachment inquiry," wrote Oversight Committee Chair James Comer (R-KY), Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan (R-OH) and Ways and Means Chair Jason Smith (R-MO).

Those criminal referrals were sent to Special Counsel David Weiss and Attorney General Merrick Garland on the same day House Republicans voted to hold Garland in contempt for turning over a transcript of President Biden’s interview with the special prosecutor while withholding audio of it.

In the wake of the Hunter Biden guilty verdict, Republicans now say Department of Justice lawyers are complicit in a cover up.

“I think it's just an attempt to try to say, ‘Oh, we're not a two-tier justice system,’” Greene said. “And they [don’t] want to prosecute BLM rioters, Antifa and all these other people that caused $2 billion in damage.”

It’s more than just a different system of justice: the “deep state” is now in the driver’s seat at the DOJ, according to many in the GOP.

“The Hunter Biden trial was a veneer. There wasn't a sincere prosecution,” Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) told Raw Story.

While House Republicans voted along party lines to launch a formal impeachment inquiry into President Biden at the end of last year, the effort has gone nowhere in the GOP-controlled House.

That’s in part because their star witness, retired Russian figure skater Alexander Smirnov, went from being an FBI informant to being charged with lying and creating false documents about President Joe Biden and his son Hunter.

While on a private fundraising call last year, Gaetz dismissed the Biden impeachment effort — “I don’t believe that we are endeavoring upon a legitimate impeachment of Joe Biden” — since then he’s been raising alarms about bribes the Oversight Committee has failed to link to the president.

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Even though his committee has failed to make the case that Biden corruption is a family affair leading all the way to the White House, Gaetz dismisses the Hunter Biden gun case as “dumb.” He says DOJ lawyers need to do more — and broaden their investigation.

“I identify strongly with the statement from the Trump campaign that it was a distraction from the real Biden crimes. These guys are moving around millions of dollars in Chinese bribe money, and what we got him on was lying on a gun form? It’d be like getting Jeffrey Dahmer for littering,” Gaetz said, referencing the convicted serial killer.

Dumb or not, many Republicans are now watching to see whether Hunter Biden gets any jail time for his first time, non-violent felony conviction.

“Well, I think they considered the facts and found him guilty. It’ll be interesting to see what his consequences are,” Rep. Ralph Norman (R-SC) told Raw Story. “If you’re on drugs, should you really have a gun? It’s either a law or it’s not a law. If they don’t believe in it, it’s like anything else, you gotta change it.”

While Norman’s closely watching the case against the first son, he, too, accuses the Department of Justice of playing politics even after the special prosecutor won a conviction this week.

“I do think it's a smokescreen,” Norman said. “I mean, look at what Hunter Biden’s gotten by with. $8 million in art sales. I don’t think he’s an artist.”

President Biden has said he will not pardon Hunter Biden.

“I will accept the outcome of this case and will continue to respect the judicial process as Hunter considers an appeal," President Biden said. "Jill and I love our son, and we are so proud of the man he is today. So many families who have had loved ones battle addiction understand the feeling of pride seeing someone you love come out the other side and be so strong and resilient in recovery."

President Biden also reaffirmed his loyalty to his family.

"Jill and I will always be there for Hunter and the rest of our family with our love and support,” Biden said. “Nothing will ever change that."

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