[ad_1]
The fur was flying in a contentious listening to Thursday evening because the Home Oversight and Investigations Committee handed a decision to carry Lawyer Basic Merrick Garland in contempt of Congress. Democrats, with some assist from GOP Chair James Comer, uncovered the purely political motives behind this assault on Merrick and President Joe Biden over the White Home’s refusal to show over audio and video recordings from Biden’s interview with particular counsel Robert Hur.
The White Home claimed govt privilege on the Hur recordings, with counsel Ed Siskel saying in a letter to Congress that the GOP lawmakers had no respectable legislative goal and that their intent in getting the recording was apparent—“to cut them up, distort them, and use them for partisan political functions.”
Comer proved precisely that Thursday simply earlier than the listening to, sending out a fundraising enchantment—utilizing his Oversight Committee title—declaring that “Biden and his advisors are terrified that I’ll launch the recordings, forcing the media and Democrats to reply for the dismal decline of Biden’s psychological state.”
The highest Democrat on the committee, Rep. Jamie Raskin, blasted Comer in his opening assertion. “I assumed you had been severe in regards to the authorized enterprise right here and never simply one other political huckster calling hearings to make a buck.”
Democratic Rep. Jared Moskowitz of Florida supplied a must-see “spirited studying” of Comer’s fundraising pitch, after declaring that the listening to had been delayed in order that GOP members may make a pilgrimage to Manhattan to attend Donald Trump’s hush cash trial. He famous that the pitch got here from “the desk of the Oversight Chairman,” including “I’m unsure you are able to do that, however I’m not an ethics skilled.”
It was downhill from Republicans after that, largely because of the antics of—who else—Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene who threw the method into chaos with a private assault on Democratic Rep. Jasmine Crockett of Texas, jibing “I feel your pretend eyelashes are messing up what you’re studying.”
The following battle lasted practically an hour, with Comer struggling to regain order, and culminated in a vote on whether or not to permit Greene to proceed to take part. It led to a party-line 22-20 vote, with one exception: Greene’s arch nemesis Rep. Lauren Boebert voted with Democrats to muffle Greene.
To get a way of how surreal the entire mess was, there’s this: “I simply wish to apologize to the American individuals,” Boebert mentioned. “When issues get as heated as they’ve, sadly, it’s a humiliation on our physique as a complete.”
The entire debacle, one Democrat advised, was fueled by the booze sure members consumed earlier than the listening to—and an viewers of lawmakers ingesting throughout it. One panel member claimed “we’ve got some members within the room who’re ingesting contained in the listening to room, who are usually not members of this listening to.”
The crass politics of Comer, the Greene chaos, the partying—it’s all a mirrored image on simply how low the GOP has sunk. It’s additionally making Speaker Mike Johnson’s job that a lot more durable. As a result of the hardliners are going to push him to carry a vote on the contempt decision, and among the extra average—and susceptible—Republicans don’t wish to go wherever close to it.
Republican Rep. David Joyce of Illinois is considered one of them, telling Politico that Congress has “essential” work to do “however going after the legal professional basic isn’t considered one of them.”
RELATED STORIES:
Democrat calls out ‘do-nothing’ GOP for attending ‘cult chief’s’ trial
Watch high Democrat slam GOP for defending Trump’s ‘indefensible acts’
Marketing campaign Motion
[ad_2]
Source link