Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) and other Democrats recently took turns while blasting Republicans after what they called the “embarrassing spectacle” of First Son Hunter Biden’s closed-door testimony.
It has been noted that things haven’t been going great with the Republican effort to impeach Biden over his son Hunter Biden’s business dealings, as key informant Alexander Smirnov sits in jail after being arrested for lying about a major component of the probe.
And if Democrats are to be believed, Wednesday’s closed-door testimony scheduled after Hunter tried to crash a public hearing to testify several weeks ago didn’t go well either.
On Wednesday’s edition of CNN Newsroom, the network aired a press conference during a break in the testimony. Raskin and a parade of Democrats including Reps.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Eric Swalwell (D-CA), and Dan Goldman (D-NY) blasted Republicans for obsessing over speakerphones (“Didn’t realize it was the Devil’s technology”), asking “inappropriate” questions, and discovering nothing to support their allegations during the deposition:
REP. JAMIE RASKIN: When we went into today’s transcribed interview with Hunter Biden, we had a dozen witnesses who told us that Joe Biden was not involved in any way in Hunter’s business, that he did not profit from Hunter’s business, and that he rendered no official favors or benefits to Hunter’s business.
And nothing that we heard from Hunter Biden has changed that in any way. In fact, he has emphatically and repeatedly underscored to the Republicans that his father was not involved in any way in his businesses, did not profit from his businesses, and Hunter neither asked him for any official favors nor received any official favors from Joe Biden.
So, what we saw, I think, was a rather embarrassing spectacle where the Republicans continued to belabor completely trivial points. They seemed to be obsessively focused on speakerphones and use of speakerphones. I did not know that that was the Devil’s technology, but apparently it is.
And, I believe, based on this first hour, that this whole thing really has been a tremendous waste of our legislative time and the people’s resources…
AOC: What we just witnessed over the last hour was, I think, a deep sea fishing expedition, because the Republican case has completely fallen apart over the last several weeks, after it’s been exposed that the critical, one of their most key pieces of information was based on a source that was in communication with Russian intelligence. They are now trying to scramble to find anything to substantiate their fairytale, is what we should call this.
But I think more disturbingly, what we are seeing is, is just a complete and an inappropriate expedition into, the president’s son. And for matters and subjects that are completely unrelated to an impeachment investigation. And I think it is extremely disturbing to see the lack of professionalism, the lack of grounding and the abuse of public resources and abuse of public power in order to pursue something that truly, whose point at this juncture is very unclear.
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REP. ERIC SWALWELL: They’ve got nothing. That’s what we just witnessed for the last hour. One of their witnesses has been indicted for working with Russian intelligence and another witness, has been indicted for working with Chinese intelligence. Another witness is serving a 14-year felony sentence. This is fourth and 20 on their own ten, and they don’t have Patrick Mahomes.
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REP. DAN GOLDMAN: I’ll be brief. I want to be very clear. That first hour of this much-anticipated testimony was the nail in the coffin to what is a complete bogus and sham impeachment inquiry.
