The White House on Friday demanded Speaker Mike Johnson end his impeachment crusade against President Joe Biden, saying ‘enough is enough.’
‘The investigation has continually turned up evidence that, in fact, the President did nothing wrong,’ White House counsel Edward Siskel wrote in a letter to Johnson.
‘It is obviously time to move on, Mr. Speaker. This impeachment is over.’
The aggressive new tone from the White House comes as Republicans have essentially come to a standstill in their effort to impeach Biden.
Johnson, who has a thin majority in the House, doesn’t have the votes to impeach the president. But ending the probe would essentially be a declaration that Biden did nothing wrong – an admission Republicans don’t want to make in an election year.
The White House is demanding House Republicans end their impeachment probe of President Joe Biden
The speaker has acknowledged that it’s unclear if investigation will disclose impeachable offenses and admits ‘people have gotten frustrated’ that it has dragged on this long.
‘Does it reach the `treason, high crimes and misdemeanor´ standard?’ Johnson said at the House Republican retreat, referring to the Constitution´s high bar for impeachment. ‘Everyone will have to make that evaluation when we pull all the evidence together.’
Siskel, in his four-page letter to Johnson, points out Republicans have spent a year investigating Biden ‘in an effort to find something—anything—to hurt the President politically’ but have turned up nothing.
‘It is clear the House Republican impeachment is over,’ Siskel writes.
He goes on to berate Johnson for the investigation, calling it ‘abusive.’
‘Instead of admitting the truth that the President did nothing wrong, the Majority is wasting even more time on abusive steps like trying to re-interview witnesses who already testified—perhaps hoping the facts will be different the second time around. This is just the latest abusive tactic in this investigation,’ he writes.
‘It has targeted the President’s children, grandchildren, siblings, and in-laws for no reason. It has intruded into private citizens’ personal records on everything from medical visits to birthday presents.’
White House counsel Edward Siskel’s letter to Speaker Mike Johnson
Speaker Mike Johnson, who has a thin majority in the House, doesn’t have the votes to impeach President Joe Biden
White House counsel Ed Siskel wrote to Speaker Johnson, saying: ‘It is clear the House Republican impeachment is over’
Siskel’s letter comes three days after congressional testimony by former special counsel Robert Hur, who investigated Biden’s mishandling of classified documents.
Hur decided not to prosecute Biden and his probe failed to unearth any bombshell revelations linked to the impeachment probe.
Democrats have always argued the impeachment probe was election-year politics to try and undermine Biden in his bid for a second term.
Republicans had centered their probe around Biden’s son Hunter, arguing that Hunter used his father’s name and political power to cash in on business connections to increase the family wealth.
President Biden said repeatedly he was never involved in his son’s business deals.
And Republicans’ closed-door deposition of Hunter Biden didn’t deliver the hoped-for smoking gun, leaving the probe at a standstill.
Hunter Biden responded aggressively to Republicans.
‘For more than a year, your committees have hunted me in your partisan political pursuit of my dad,’ Hunter Biden, according to a copy of his opening statement, which was given in a closed-door hearing.
‘You have trafficked in innuendo, distortion, and sensationalism – all the while ignoring the clear and convincing evidence staring you in the face. You do not have evidence to support the baseless and MAGA-motivated conspiracies about my father because there isn’t any.’
House Oversight Chairman James Comer and House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, who are leading the inquiry, said there is more work to do.
Comer has said he will make criminal referrals in his report but hasn’t said of who.
‘At the end of the day, what does accountability look like? It looks like criminal referrals. It looks like referring people to the Department of Justice,’ he told Fox News.
Comer said he was ‘very prepared’ to bring criminal referrals and directly referenced the possibility of the ‘next president’ picking them up.
‘If Merrick Garland’s Department of Justice won’t take any potential criminal referrals seriously, then maybe the next president, with a new Attorney General, will,’ Comer said.
Some House Republicans see criminal referrals to the DoJ as an ‘exit strategy’ to get them out of holding an impeachment vote, ABC News reported.
Republicans are also considering new laws that would require tighter financial disclosure and foreign lobbying guardrails.
The Republicans targeted Hunter Biden in their probe; he is seen above with his lawyer Abbe Lowell, arriving for his closed-door deposition in the Capitol in February
Former special counsel Robert Hur’s probe failed to unearth any bombshell revelations linked to the impeachment probe
After 14 months, over 100,000 pages of documents and over 40 interviews Republicans have failed to uncover evidence to support their allegations against Biden.
Additionally, Alexander Smirnov, who Republicans called ‘a highly credible FBI source,’ was indicted by special counsel David Weiss on felony false statement and obstruction charges after he allegedly provided false information about Joe and Hunter Biden. He pleaded not guilty to the charges.
Republican Rep. Troy Nehls of Texas, who supports impeaching Biden but acknowledges the GOP doesn’t have the votes, told CNN: ‘We are eight months away from a presidential election. We’ve done our job and laid a good case out there. Let’s move on. Our focus should be on getting Donald Trump elected.’
‘If the impeachment vote would fail, how would that make us look?’ Nehls asked.