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EXCLUSIVE: Email Shows Weiss Violated DOJ Policy By Sending Letters To Cover For Garland

BY: MARGOT CLEVELAND | OCTOBER 03, 2023

Merrick Garland sitting at a desk with a binder

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MARGOT CLEVELAND

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The Department of Justice directed Delaware U.S. Attorney David Weiss not to respond to congressional inquiries, according to an email provided exclusively to The Federalist. That same email stressed that under DOJ policy, only its Office of Legislative Affairs, or OLA, can respond to requests from the legislative branch.

Yet Weiss would later sign and dispatch a letter to the House Judiciary Committee in response to an inquiry sent directly to Attorney General Merrick Garland. And in that letter, Weiss misleadingly claimed he had “been granted ultimate authority over” the Hunter Biden investigation. The DOJ’s disregard of its own policy provides further proof that both Garland and Weiss intended to obfuscate the reality that Weiss never held the reins of the Hunter Biden investigation.

On May 9, 2022, Republican Sens. Chuck Grassley of Iowa and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin wrote to Delaware U.S. Attorney Weiss inquiring about several aspects of the Hunter Biden investigation. After the senators sent a follow-up email to the Delaware U.S. attorney’s office requesting a response by week’s end, Delaware’s First Assistant U.S. Attorney Shannon Hanson asked the DOJ about protocol and then updated Weiss, stating in an email:

Consistent with my conversation with [redacted] last night, we are supposed to forward this and any other correspondence to OLA. Per DOJ policy, only OLA can respond on behalf of the Department to a request from the legislative branch.

On June 9, 2022, the OLA, as provided for in the DOJ’s policy, responded to Grassley and Johnson’s letter. The following month, Grassley and Johnson dispatched a second letter to Weiss, as well as Attorney General Merrick Garland and FBI Director Christopher Wray. In an email reviewed by The Federalist, the Office of Legislative Affairs told Weiss’s office it would “take the lead on drafting a response” to Grassley and Johnson’s letter.

The Heritage Foundation’s Oversight Project obtained these emails and the most recent one revealing the DOJ’s policy that only the “OLA can respond on behalf of the Department to a request from the legislative branch,” after its Director Mike Howell filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit against the DOJ. The email to Weiss summarizing the DOJ policy contained in this latest batch of court-ordered disclosures proves huge given the sequence of events that occurred earlier this year.

On May 25, 2023, House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan sent a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland questioning him about the removal of the IRS whistleblowers from the Hunter Biden investigation. Although Jordan directed his inquiry to Garland, on June 7, 2023, Weiss dispatched a letter to the House Judiciary chair, noting in his opening: “Your May 25th letter to Attorney General Garland was forwarded to me, with a request that I respond on behalf of the Department.”

Weiss then stated, as Garland had previously indicated, that he (Weiss) had “been granted ultimate authority over this matter, including responsibility for deciding where, when, and whether to file charges and for making decisions necessary to preserve the integrity of the prosecution…”

That Weiss would respond on behalf of Garland raised eyebrows at the time. Jordan noted “the unusual nature of your response on behalf of Attorney General Garland,” and asked for information concerning the names of individuals who drafted or assisted in drafting the June 7 letter, as well as details concerning the drafting and dispatching of the letter.

But now we know it wasn’t merely “unusual” for Weiss to respond on behalf of the attorney general — it was in apparent violation of the DOJ policy that only the OLA would respond to legislative inquiries. And it was that same policy that prevented Weiss from responding to the earlier questions posed by Johnson and Grassley directly to the Delaware U.S. attorney.

The content of Weiss’s June 7 letter provides a pretty clear answer for why the DOJ ignored its own policy and enlisted the Delaware U.S. attorney to respond to Jordan: Garland needed Weiss to verify what the attorney general had previously told Grassley during a March 1, 2023, hearing. During that hearing, Garland expressly stated that “the U.S. attorney in Delaware has been advised that he has full authority … to bring cases in other jurisdictions if he feels it’s necessary.” Weiss’s assertion in the June 7 letter that he had “been granted ultimate authority over this matter, including responsibility for deciding where, when, and whether to file charges and for making decisions necessary to preserve the integrity of the prosecution…” seemingly confirmed Garland’s testimony.

Of course, as informed Americans now know, the release of the IRS whistleblower’s testimony — that Weiss claimed he was not the ultimate decisionmaker — forced the Delaware U.S. attorney to pen a follow-up letter to Jordan. In that June 30, 2023 sequel, Weiss, while purporting to stand by what he had previously written, contradicted his earlier representation that he had “been granted ultimate authority.” Instead, Weiss explained he had “been assured” that “if necessary,” he would be granted authority to charge Hunter Biden in any other district.

Having ultimate authority and being assured that you would be given ultimate authority if necessary are clearly two different things, yet Weiss gave cover for Garland in his June letters. Now we have further proof that the DOJ was behind those letters — otherwise, Weiss would be in violation of the department’s policy.

The DOJ did not respond to The Federalist’s request for comment on Weiss’s apparent violation of the department’s policy.

Margot Cleveland is an investigative journalist and legal analyst and serves as The Federalist’s senior legal correspondent. Margot’s work has been published at The Wall Street Journal, The American Spectator, the New Criterion (forthcoming), National Review Online, Townhall.com, the Daily Signal, USA Today, and the Detroit Free Press. She is also a regular guest on nationally syndicated radio programs and on Fox News, Fox Business, and Newsmax. Cleveland is a lawyer and a graduate of the Notre Dame Law School, where she earned the Hoynes Prive—the law school’s highest honor. She later served for nearly 25 years as a permanent law clerk for a federal appellate judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Cleveland is a former full-time university faculty member and now teaches as an adjunct from time to time. Cleveland is also of counsel for the New Civil Liberties Alliance. Cleveland is on Twitter at @ProfMJCleveland where you can read more about her greatest accomplishments—her dear husband and dear son. The views expressed here are those of Cleveland in her private capacity.

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EXCLUSIVE: U.S. Attorney Weiss Colluded With DOJ To Thwart Congressional Questioning, Emails Show

BY: MARGOT CLEVELAND | AUGUST 28, 2023

Author Margot Cleveland profile

MARGOT CLEVELAND

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Emails obtained by the Heritage Foundation following a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit and shared exclusively with The Federalist establish that on multiple occasions, the Department of Justice intervened on behalf of Delaware U.S. Attorney David Weiss to respond to congressional inquiries related to the Hunter Biden investigation. This revelation raises more questions about the June 7, 2023, letter dispatched to House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan under Weiss’s signature line, in which the Delaware U.S. attorney claimed he had “ultimate authority” over charging decisions related to Hunter Biden. It also suggests Weiss and the DOJ may have conspired to mislead Congress.

Did the DOJ’s Office of Legislative Affairs respond to Sens. Chuck Grassley and Ron Johnson’s May 9, 2022, letter seeking information concerning the Hunter Biden investigation? Weiss posed that question to one of his lead assistant U.S. attorneys, Shannon Hanson.

“Not to my knowledge,” Hanson replied, followed soon after with a second email noting that Joe Gaeta, the then-deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legislative Affairs, was working on a response. And although Grassley and Johnson had addressed their May 9, 2022, inquiry solely to Weiss, DOJ’s Office of Legislative Affairs would intercede on his behalf, responding in a letter dated June 9, 2022, that the DOJ would not respond to the questions posed.

The following month, Grassley and Johnson dispatched another letter requesting information related to the Hunter Biden investigation, addressing this letter to Weiss, as well as Attorney General Merrick Garland and FBI Director Christopher Wray. Again, the Office of Legal Counsel intervened, telling Weiss’s office in an email reviewed by The Federalist that it would “take the lead on drafting a response” to Grassley and Johnson’s letter.

These never-before-seen emails establish the Department of Justice and U.S. attorney collaborated in responding to congressional inquiries and were among the first batch of documents provided to the Heritage Foundation following a court order last week in Heritage’s FOIA case against the DOJ. That court order required the DOJ to produce, by Aug. 25, 2023, all records collected from Weiss and Assistant U.S. Attorney Lesley Wolf that were responsive to the Heritage FOIA lawsuit.

Mike Howell, director of the Heritage Foundation’s Oversight Project, initiated the FOIA request and then filed suit against the DOJ after the Biden administration attempted to slow-walk the production. Howell told The Federalist the emails show that while Garland was claiming Weiss had the independence to bring whatever charges he wanted, Garland was “simultaneously running communications from Weiss to Grassley through the political controls of Main Justice.” “It is a slap in the face,” Howell said.

Significantly, the emails also call into question the veracity of a series of exchanges between Weiss and Jordan, beginning with Weiss’s June 7 response to the May 25, 2023, letter Jordan sent to Garland. In that May 25 letter, Jordan questioned Garland on the removal of the IRS whistleblowers from the Hunter Biden investigation.

Even though the House committee addressed that letter solely to Attorney General Garland, Weiss responded to the inquiry on June 7 in a letter, which opened: “Your May 25th letter to Attorney General Garland was forwarded to me, with a request that I respond on behalf of the Department.” Weiss then claimed that, as Garland had stated, the Delaware U.S. attorney had “been granted ultimate authority over this matter, including responsibility for deciding where, when, and whether to file charges and for making decisions necessary to preserve the integrity of the prosecution…”

Two more letters would soon follow, the first being to Weiss from Jordan on June 22. In that letter, Jordan reiterated the Judiciary Committee’s need for substantive responses, before asking Weiss for more details “in light of the unusual nature of your response on behalf of Attorney General Garland…” Specifically, Jordan asked for information concerning the names of individuals who drafted or assisted in drafting the June 7, 2023, letter, as well as details concerning the drafting and dispatching of the letter.

Weiss responded in a June 30 letter that he was not at liberty to provide substantive responses to the questions concerning an ongoing investigation. The Delaware U.S. attorney then sidestepped questions about the DOJ’s role in drafting the June 7 letter, stating only that he “would like to reaffirm the contents of the June 7 letter drafted by my office” — a statement representing that the Delaware office had composed the letter.

Weiss then proceeded to “expand” on what he meant when he said in his June 7 letter that he had ultimate charging authority, writing:

As the U.S. Attorney for the District of Delaware, my charging authority is geographically limited to my home district. If venue for a case lies elsewhere, common Departmental practice is to contact the United States Attorney’s Office for the district in question and determine whether it wants to partner on the case. If not, I may request Special Attorney status from the Attorney General pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 515. Here, I have been assured that, if necessary, after the above process, I would be granted § 515 Authority in the District of Columbia, the Central District of California, or any other district where charges could be brought in this matter.

Of course, having ultimate authority and being assured that you would be given ultimate authority, if need be, are two different things. But the scandal goes beyond Weiss not having the authority to charge Hunter Biden, to what clearly seems to be an attempt by the DOJ and Weiss to mislead Congress.

It’s important to remember that when Weiss sent the June 7 letter to Jordan, the whistleblowers’ transcripts had not yet been released. Thus, neither Weiss nor the DOJ knew the specifics of the whistleblowers’ testimony, leading them to represent to Congress that Weiss had ultimate decision-making authority — something Weiss would later have to massage. Weiss’s questionable statements didn’t end there, however. In the June 30 letter, Weiss represented to Congress that he had drafted the June 7 letter.

But why would Weiss draft the June 7 letter? That letter was not even addressed to Weiss. And the emails obtained by the Heritage Foundation establish that even when congressional oversight letters were addressed directly to the Delaware U.S. attorney, Weiss did not answer them. Instead, the DOJ’s Office of Legislative Affairs intervened and spoke on his behalf.

There is a second reason to suspect Weiss did not draft the June 7 letter: the footnote reference in the correspondence to the Linder letter.

Tristan Leavitt, a former Capitol Hill staffer and the president of Empower Oversight, which is helping represent IRS whistleblower Gary Shapley, told The Federalist that when he “worked on Capitol Hill (particularly on the Senate Judiciary Committee, which did regular oversight of the Justice Department), the Department’s Office of Legislative Affairs frequently referenced the otherwise-obscure Linder letter in response to congressional oversight.”

“It’s hard to imagine the letter was widely known outside of Justice Department headquarters,” Leavitt continued, “especially in U.S. attorneys’ offices, which almost never respond directly to congressional correspondence.”

Conversely, it is easy to imagine Main Justice drafting the June 7 letter on behalf of Weiss to provide Garland cover and to seemingly corroborate the attorney general’s Senate testimony that he had given Weiss full authority to make charging decisions in the Hunter Biden investigation.

That cover may soon be blown away, however, thanks to the Heritage Foundation.

“The only reason these documents are starting to trickle out is because we sued for transparency,” Howell told The Federalist. “We’ve faced taxpayer funded resistance at every step of the way and haven’t given up,” he added, noting that “the DOJ is under a judicial order to continue this production.”

The next round of responsive documents is due by Oct. 31, and since none of the documents produced to date include references to Jordan’s May 25, 2023, letter, it seems likely we’ll see those emails in the next batch — unless House Republicans seek access to them first through a subpoena.

This article has been updated since publication.

Margot Cleveland is The Federalist’s senior legal correspondent. She is also a contributor to National Review Online, the Washington Examiner, Aleteia, and Townhall.com, and has been published in the Wall Street Journal and USA Today. Cleveland is a lawyer and a graduate of the Notre Dame Law School, where she earned the Hoynes Prize—the law school’s highest honor. She later served for nearly 25 years as a permanent law clerk for a federal appellate judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Cleveland is a former full-time university faculty member and now teaches as an adjunct from time to time. As a stay-at-home homeschooling mom of a young son with cystic fibrosis, Cleveland frequently writes on cultural issues related to parenting and special-needs children. Cleveland is on Twitter at @ProfMJCleveland. The views expressed here are those of Cleveland in her private capacity.

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GOPers Order Blinken to Turn Over All Communications with Hunter Biden After Emails Show He Lied to Congress

BY: SHAWN FLEETWOOD | MAY 02, 2023

Blinken at a U.S.-Philippines Dialogue conference

Following revelations that he allegedly lied under oath to Congress, Secretary of State Antony Blinken is facing calls from Senate Republicans to turn over communication records related to Hunter Biden and his shady business engagements.

On Monday, Republican Sens. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin and Chuck Grassley of Iowa sent a letter to Blinken demanding that he turn over any and all records “referring or relating to Hunter Biden, his business dealings, or his family’s business dealings” by May 15. The request comes as part of Senate Republicans’ investigation into the Biden family’s foreign business ventures.

In the letter, Johnson and Grassley document a series of emails revealing how Blinken seemingly lied under oath about his prior communications with Hunter. While testifying before Congress on Dec. 22, 2020, Blinken was asked if he had any means of correspondence —including phone calls, emails, or texts — with Hunter Biden during his time as President Barack Obama’s deputy secretary of state, to which Blinken replied, “No.”

Emails from Hunter’s laptop, however, appear to contradict Blinken’s December 2020 testimony. As documented in the Johnson-Grassley letter, Hunter emailed Blinken at his personal email address on May 22, 2015, asking if the then-deputy secretary of state was available to meet.

“I know you are impossibly busy but would like to get your advice on a couple of things,” Hunter wrote, to which Blinken replied, “Absolutely.”

Blinken sent another email to Hunter a few months later on July 22, indicating the two met in person.

“Great to… see you and catch up,” Blinken wrote. “You will love this: after you left, Marjorie, the wonderful african american woman who sits in my outer office (and used to be Colin Powell’s assistant) said to me :’He sure is pleasant on the eyes.’ Tell you wife.”

The Johnson-Grassley letter also raises questions regarding Blinken’s knowledge of Hunter’s role as a Burisma Holdings board member. Burisma Holdings is a Ukrainian gas company that paid Hunter $50,000 a month despite the president’s son having no prior energy experience. Joe Biden has claimed that while vice president, he threatened to withdraw U.S. aid if then-Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko “didn’t fire state prosecutor Viktor Shokin, who was investigating Burisma at the time.”

Despite Blinken claiming to have no knowledge of Hunter’s Burisma ties during his December 2020 testimony, emails from Hunter’s laptop reveal that Blinken’s wife, Evan Ryan, “corresponded directly with Hunter Biden (from her personal email address) in an apparent attempt to connect [Blinken] with representatives of Burisma’s U.S. lobbying firm, Blue Star Strategies.”

In what appears to be an email chain dated July 14, 2016, Hunter informed Ryan that “S” and “K” — who appear to be Sally Painter and Karen Tramontano, Blue Star Strategies’ Chief Operating Officer and Chief Executive Officer — told him “they called the State Department and left a message.” In her email to Hunter, Ryan appeared to reference Blinken, writing “He didn’t get the msg” and “He said if we can get him their numbers he can call them late afternoon DC time tmrw.”

While this specific email exchange doesn’t name Blinken, Johnson and Grassley noted that State Department documents obtained during their inquiry “make it clear that [Blinken was] concurrently trying to connect with representatives from Blue Star Strategies.”

“It seems highly unlikely that you had no idea of Hunter Biden’s association with Burisma while your wife was apparently coordinating with Hunter Biden to potentially connect you with Burisma’s U.S. representatives,” Johnson and Grassley wrote. “Because your testimony is inaccurate, Congress and the public must rely on your records as the source for information about your dealings with Hunter Biden.”

These revelations follow testimony from an ex-CIA official, who claimed that Blinken, during his time as a Biden campaign adviser, was the catalyst for the creation of a debunked letter from former intelligence officials that falsely claimed the Hunter Biden laptop was Russian disinformation.

Shawn Fleetwood is a Staff Writer for The Federalist and a graduate of the University of Mary Washington. He also serves as a state content writer for Convention of States Action and his work has been featured in numerous outlets, including RealClearPolitics, RealClearHealth, and Conservative Review. Follow him on Twitter @ShawnFleetwood

SHAWN FLEETWOOD

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Wisconsin’s Supreme Court Race Is the Left’s Opening to Reverse Years of Conservative Victories

BY: DAVE CRAIG AND JAKE CURTIS | APRIL 03, 2023

split screen of two candidates — Wisconsin’s growing leftist base sees an opportunity to overturn all of the hard-fought reforms by flipping the state’s high court.

DAVE CRAIG AND JAKE CURTIS

On Tuesday, Wisconsinites will once again head to the polls in a race that has garnered national attention and set national spending records for a judicial race. According to the most recent Wispolitics.com tally, the two Wisconsin Supreme Court candidates and outside groups have combined for over $45 million in spending. What’s at stake? All of the reforms of the Gov. Scott Walker era, and more.

Home to Walker, former Speaker Paul Ryan, former RNC Chairman and White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, and conservative star Sen. Ron Johnson, Wisconsin has enjoyed an outsized role in national politics since 2010. Instead of cautiously governing like so many administrations in purple states, Walker and his allies advanced some of the boldest reforms in the nation. Starting with the historic Act 10 that resulted in a siege of the Capitol (and over $15 billion in taxpayer savings), conservatives advanced bold reforms like Right to Work, voter ID, concealed carry, castle doctrine, and a dramatic expansion of school choice.

Now, Wisconsin’s growing leftist base sees an opportunity to overturn all of the hard-fought reforms by flipping the state’s high court. Politico recently proclaimed the race “could be the beginning of the end for GOP dominance.” This would obviously be bad news for conservatives nationally since Wisconsin will undoubtedly play a huge role in who is president in 2025.

The two candidates running to replace the former conservative Chief Justice on the current 4-3 conservative court could not be any more different, and whoever wins will determine the ideological control of the court for years. Running as the progressive is Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge Janet Protasiewicz. Instead of articulating a coherent judicial philosophy, she has consistently emphasized her “values” and how they will influence her decisions. She has also troublingly declared that Wisconsin’s legislative maps are rigged – announcing her thoughts on an issue that is likely to come before the court if liberals gain the majority. She has stated that she disagrees with the U.S. Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision that returned abortion law to the states. She is also the candidate that the left apparently sees as showing they “are done pretending that judges are merely legal umpires.”

Contrast Protasiewicz’s activism with the originalist approach of former Justice Dan Kelly, appointed to the court by Gov. Scott Walker, who authored historic decisions during his four years on the court and consistently quotes from the Federalist Papers on the campaign trail. His lead opinion in Tetra Tech upended decades of deference to administrative agencies.

While Kelly has been supported by the Republicans and Protasiewicz by the Democrats, it is clear that Protasiewicz views the job of a judge as a super partisan legislator, supplanting the legislature’s authority with that of her own. Forecasting what a liberal majority would do Wisconsin’s duly-enacted reform regime, liberal Justice Jill Karofsky herself has declared specifically that “everything that Wisconsinites care about is on the line in this election, from abortion rights to fair maps to the 2024 election to democracy itself, all of those things are going to be on the ballot on April 4th…” These are all issues that have been settled by the democratically elected legislature but are apparently all on the table for a liberal majority of the court.

While abortion, crime, and redistricting have been the main focus of the media and outside groups during the campaign, several other cases could be brought which would fundamentally transform the landscape in Wisconsin. Even cases that have already been addressed by the U.S. Supreme Court are at risk of novel interpretations under the Wisconsin constitution by a new progressive majority.

An issue impacting tens of thousands of Wisconsin families that could be dramatically affected by the balance of the state Supreme Court is school choice. In 1998, the Wisconsin Supreme Court upheld the choice program for religious schools in Jackson v. Benson. There, the court reversed the lower court, holding that the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program was valid under both the Establishment Clause and Article I, Section 18 of the Wisconsin Constitution, which prohibits the use of money from the public treasury to be used for the benefit of religious societies, religious schools, or seminaries. The holding was based in large part on the fact that students in the program were not compelled to attend sectarian schools nor forced to participate in religious activities. The Court further held that public funds may be given to third parties as long as the program on its face is neutral between sectarian and nonsectarian alternatives and that the transmission of funds is guided by the decisions of independent third parties.

While the decision in Jackson has been in place for a generation, a court viewing itself as a super-legislature could undo the decision in part, or in whole, based on a narrowed view of the constitutional provisions reviewed in that case, particularly relative to monies “drawn from the treasury” that are used in the choice program. A court decision holding a strict view of the provision could decimate a program that provides alternatives to families desperately looking for an alternative to failing public schools.

Another issue likely to surface in the event the ideological makeup of the court shifts, as it has recently in other states, is the constitutionality of Wisconsin’s voter ID law. In League of Women Voters v. Walker and Milwaukee Branch of NAACP v. Walker, leftist groups challenged Wisconsin’s 2011 voter ID law, claiming the legislature lacked authority to enact a voting qualification under the Wisconsin constitution and that the law was an undue burden on the right to vote. Upholding the law, the Court noted that requiring an ID was within the legislature’s authority to provide for laws relating to elector registration under Article III, Section 2, that the law was a reasonable regulation that “could improve and modernize election procedures, safeguard voter confidence in the outcome of elections and deter voter fraud,” and that the burdens of gathering the required documents, traveling, and obtaining a photograph ID were not a substantial burden.

In a challenge to the voter ID law under the state constitution’s right to vote, an activist court could hold that a record demonstrating that numerous individuals claiming to have been deterred from voting because of the burden of obtaining an ID is evidence of a “substantial burden” that outweighs the threat of voter fraud and could strike down the law. The left will undoubtedly come after this important law ahead of the 2024 election as it has recently in other states. In a state with razor-thin margins of victory for conservative super-stars like Sen. Ron Johnson, opening the gate to fraudulent votes in the absence of a voter ID law could have major consequences in 2024 and beyond.

Finally, and least covered by the media, are the ramifications the court race might have on the shift of power back to the deep state. In the 2018 case Tetra Tech EC, Inc. v. Wis. Dep’t of Revenue, the court departed from its practice of “deferring to administrative agencies’ conclusions of law.” In a case where a citizen may be challenging an agency’s interpretation of law or administrative rule, the court would no longer review the agency’s action with a “bias” toward the agency’s own interpretation. Agency interpretation is an issue that arises in courts every day across the country, measuring the amount of authority an agency wields on virtually any issue, ranging from taxation to education to election administration – many times involving an agency seizing authority the legislature never gave it. A restoration of agency deference by an activist court could result in an immediate shift of authority from the legislative branch to the unelected officials in the executive branch.

During the final days of the race, former Justice Dan Kelly is sprinting across to the state with a final closing message: saving the court. But the race is about more than just the court. It could impact policies duly enacted by the legislature that conservatives have worked for a generation to obtain. It will make a difference in securing elections and electing strong conservatives like Ron Johnson, who has demanded Covid transparency and has taken on the deep state, or electing central planners like Tammy Baldwin who want to strip us of our freedoms. The election on Tuesday presents a fundamental choice to voters.

Do they want Wisconsin to lurch backward with a progressive court that will undo so many of the reforms the legislature and Gov. Walker worked to implement over the last decade, or are they going to vote to save the court by elevating a former justice that will ensure a conservative majority that respects the law as written by the legislature? The choice is obvious. Save the court and save the state.

Dave Craig is a Waukesha attorney and served in the Wisconsin Legislature from 2011 to 2021. Prior to his election, he worked as an aide to Congressman Paul Ryan. Jake Curtis is an Ozaukee attorney who previously served as an agency Chief Legal Counsel in the Walker Administration.

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FBI’s False Labeling of Biden Laptop as Disinformation Is Even Worse Than It Seems. Here’s Why

BY: MARGOT CLEVELAND | JULY 26, 2022

This scandal is no longer just about the Biden family; it’s about every member of the law enforcement and intelligence communities who put our country at risk by failing to do their jobs.

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MARGOT CLEVELAND

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FBI whistleblowers claim that agents opened a sham investigation into Hunter Biden to brand reliable and verifiable derogatory evidence as “disinformation,” according to an explosive news release issued yesterday by Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa.

If true, beyond exposing the FBI’s role in running cover for the Biden family, the whistleblowers’ claims prove significant for a second reason: By failing to thoroughly vet the evidence in its possession related to Hunter Biden — which included the hard drive for the MacBook Hunter had abandoned at a repair shop — the intelligence community ignored a momentous national security threat, namely that the Russians potentially possessed a second Hunter Biden laptop.

Late Monday, Grassley issued a news release citing “multiple FBI whistleblowers, including those in senior positions,” who raised “the alarm about tampering by senior FBI and Justice Department officials in politically sensitive investigations,” including “investigative activity involving derogatory information on Hunter Biden’s financial and foreign business activities.” According to the Iowa Republican, the whistleblowers alleged that Washington Field Office Assistant Special Agent in Charge Timothy “Thibault and other FBI officials sought to falsely portray as disinformation evidence acquired from multiple sources that provided the FBI derogatory information related to Hunter Biden’s financial and foreign business activities, even though some of that information had already been or could be verified.”

The news release added that “in August of 2020, FBI supervisory intelligence analyst Brian Auten opened an assessment, which was used by a team of agents at FBI headquarters to improperly discredit and falsely claim that derogatory information about Biden’s activities was disinformation, causing investigative activity and sourcing to be shut down.” “The FBI headquarters team allegedly placed their assessment findings in a restricted access subfolder, effectively flagging sources and derogatory evidence related to Hunter Biden as disinformation while shielding the justification for such findings from scrutiny,” according to Grassley.

The Iowa senator claimed that “Thibault also reportedly ordered the closure of a stream of information related to Hunter Biden and sought to improperly mark the matter within FBI systems in a way that would prevent it from being re-opened in the future.” “The FBI headquarters team allegedly claimed that reporting from the stream was at risk of disinformation,” but the whistleblowers told Grassley, “that all of the information obtained through that stream was already verified or verifiable.”

The FBI whistleblowers’ charges, if accurate, are devastating and mean that at a time that Hunter Biden was already reportedly under investigation by the Delaware U.S. Attorney’s Office, rather than work with the agents already investigating then-candidate Joe Biden’s son, FBI headquarters initiated its own “assessment.” Then, according to the whistleblowers, agents improperly shut down sources, falsely framed evidence as disinformation, and hid the reasoning for that determination from other FBI agents behind restricted areas.

The press release also suggests that the FBI’s “assessment” served to frame the investigation Grassley and Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., were conducting into Hunter Biden’s foreign business dealing as tainted by Russian disinformation. As part of that investigation, in May 2020, “Senate Republicans issued a subpoena seeking documents from the younger Biden and asked for information related to more than two dozen entities, including Burisma,” which was the Ukrainian energy company that paid Hunter nearly $1 million a year to sit on its board.

With the Trump-Biden presidential contest in full force, Grassley and Johnson’s investigation into Hunter prompted pushback from Democrats, with Democrat members of the Gang of Eight sending a letter and classified addendum in July 2020 to FBI Director Christopher Wray “specifically citing the Johnson-Grassley probe into Hunter Biden as reason for an urgent briefing for Congress about foreign ‘disinformation.’”

The following month, Democrat Sens. Gary Peters of Michigan and Ron Wyden of Oregon wrote Grassley and Johnson and requested that members of the Senate Homeland Security and Finance committees, which they chaired, “receive a briefing from the FBI’s foreign influence task force related to their ongoing Biden investigations.”

According to an August 5, 2020, Washington Post article, “the Democrats have requested the member briefing for months, and the FBI and U.S. intelligence agencies have previously briefed committee staff on possible foreign disinformation.” The FBI later briefed both Grassley and Johnson on August 6, 2020, but according to the senators, that briefing was both “unsolicited and unnecessary” and failed to provide any new information to the senators or any specific allegations that they had received “disinformation” as part of their Hunter Biden investigation.

Given that FBI supervisory intelligence analyst Brian Auten, according to whistleblowers, opened his assessment into Hunter in August, the whistleblowers’ allegations raise serious questions concerning whether Democrats pressured the FBI into launching an investigation into Hunter as a pretext to provide the desired “disinformation briefing.”

Further, in April of 2021, someone leaked the fact that the FBI had briefed Grassley and Johnson on August 6, 2020, with the Washington Post running a story painting the senators as reckless in their investigation into Hunter Biden’s foreign business dealings by suggesting they “ignored FBI warnings and thus may have been manipulated by the Kremlin.” As the Wall Street Journal reported at the time, it seems possible that “the FBI set up two Members of Congress for political attack under the guise of a ‘defensive briefing.’”

The whistleblowers’ accusations then, when coupled with the media coverage, suggest that an agent from FBI headquarters opened an assessment to provide cover to Hunter Biden, to eliminate source trails for the investigation into then-candidate Joe Biden’s son, and to taint the legitimate inquiry into Hunter Biden’s business dealings. That scandal, however, represents but half the issue because the whistleblowers’ statements, if true, suggest the assessment of Hunter was a sham. And as a sham, the agents would not vet the evidence available to them, which would have included the MacBook laptop Hunter had abandoned at a repair shop in Delaware.

The FBI seized that laptop in December of 2019, after being alerted to its existence in October. At that time, FBI agents were reportedly told that in addition to pornography, the computer had information “dealing with foreign interests, a pay-for-play scheme linked to the former administration, [and] lots of foreign money.”

What the FBI did after seizing the laptop in December of 2019 is unknown. However, given that the FBI was reportedly told it contained “a pay-for-play scheme linked to the former administration, [and] lots of foreign money,” any legitimate investigation would have involved reviewing the laptop for information relevant to Grassley and Johnson’s investigations. And had the FBI reviewed the laptop, agents would have discovered a video recording capturing Hunter Biden saying that in 2018, another laptop went missing when he was “partying in Las Vegas,” and that Hunter believed it was stolen by a group of Russians.

The video then showed a prostitute asking Hunter if he worried the Russian thieves would try to “blackmail” him. “Yeah, in some way, yeah,” Hunter replied, noting his father is “running for president,” and that “I talk about it all the time.” Hunter had also noted that the computer had “tons” of compromising videos on it.

But it was not just the compromising videos of Hunter of concern, but the financial information likely on that laptop that could implicate his father in the pay-to-play scandal. If that information were in the hands of “the Russians,” as Hunter believed, the national security risk was huge and demanded the intelligence community conduct a defensive briefing of Joe Biden.

Instead, it appears from the whistleblowers’ comments that a non-investigation took place, with legitimate sources and evidence falsely categorized as disinformation, and then rather than provide Biden a defensive briefing, the senators received one.

This scandal is no longer just about the Biden family; it is about every member of the law enforcement and intelligence communities who put our country at risk by failing to do their jobs.

Margot Cleveland is The Federalist’s senior legal correspondent. She is also a contributor to National Review Online, the Washington Examiner, Aleteia, and Townhall.com, and has been published in the Wall Street Journal and USA Today. Cleveland is a lawyer and a graduate of the Notre Dame Law School, where she earned the Hoynes Prize—the law school’s highest honor. She later served for nearly 25 years as a permanent law clerk for a federal appellate judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Cleveland is a former full-time university faculty member and now teaches as an adjunct from time to time. As a stay-at-home homeschooling mom of a young son with cystic fibrosis, Cleveland frequently writes on cultural issues related to parenting and special-needs children. Cleveland is on Twitter at @ProfMJCleveland. The views expressed here are those of Cleveland in her private capacity.

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9 Times Sen. Ron Johnson Triggered the Left — And Turned Out to Be Right

Reported BY: KYLEE ZEMPEL | JANUARY 14, 2022

Sen. Ron Johnson is not planning his Senate retirement anytime soon. The Wisconsin lawmaker is running for reelection, he announced this week, at which the corrupt media predictably came out, guns blazing.

CNN’s Chris Cillizza, for instance, announced that the “Senate’s leading conspiracy theorist is running for another term,” and The Nation ran an article calling him an “off-the-deep-end” senator.

But while attention-seeking pundits attack Johnson for opinions that don’t conform to the left-wing narrative (opinions held among many Americans outside the Beltway, by the way), his opinions are often proved to be exactly right. There’s quite a long list of “Ron John” statements and actions that, after sending the media into a tizzy and Big Tech giants into a censorship spree, have held up quite well over time. Here are some of them.

Jan. 6

During a February 2021 hearing to examine the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, Johnson condemned the violence then went on to read an eyewitness account of the day’s events. Originally published in The Federalist, it detailed the presence of provocateurs in the crowd and confusion among many of the pro-police “MAGA” protesters who didn’t attend the rally to perpetrate violence.

The media lost it, ignoring his condemnation of the violence to smear Johnson as a conspiratorial nutjob. CNN, New York Daily News, Daily Beast, The Washington Post, the Boston Globe, and even the Washington Examiner ran articles attacking him as “deranged.”

Yet the account Johnson read was entered into the record without objection from lawmakers of either party. And since then, instead of learning more information about Jan. 6 that refutes eyewitness accounts of “provocateurs,” Americans have been treated to political playacting (including literal musical theater) from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s sham commission, more hyperventilating from the media, and repeated stonewalling from the FBI on questions about potential provocateurs caught on video, such as Ray Epps.

Johnson was also ahead of the game on the Capitol Police component of Jan. 6, including pushing to correct the media and Capitol Police’s lies about what happened to the late Officer Brian Sicknick.

COVID Shots

Johnson has been a consistent voice for those who don’t feel they have one on Covid shots and the mandates that accompany them. He’s given Americans a forum to discuss their firsthand adverse shot reactions, for which he’s been smeared in the corrupt media as “fundamentally dangerous” and as a peddler of “misinformation.”

In November 2021, YouTube suspended Johnson’s channel for the fifth time for seven days for a video of a panel on vaccine-related injuries, labeling it “Covid misinformation.” Yet we know adverse reactions do occur.

In April 2021, when Johnson questioned forcing every American to get vaccinated and slammed the idea of pushing vaccine mandates on citizens, Anthony Fauci came after him on MSNBC — which other outlets amplified, calling the senator an “idiot anti-vaxxer.”

Fast-forward to 2022, and Johnson has been vindicated: Even with a federal vaccine mandate in place, case numbers are up higher than ever; and even the triple-vaccinated are still contracting and spreading the virus.

Early COVID Treatment

Big Tech has twice censored the sitting U.S. senator by nuking videos discussing early Covid treatments. In February 2021, YouTube removed videos of sworn testimony from Dr. Pierre Kory about early treatments. Then in June, YouTube suspended Johnson’s account for one week for remarks he made about early Covid treatments in Milwaukee.

Shutting down scientific inquiry and debate is inherently anti-science, however, as scientists who dissent from some of the questionable Covid conventional wisdom have pointed out.

“For science to work, you have to have an open exchange of ideas,” Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, a professor of medicine at Stanford University, has said of this type of censorship. “If you’re going to make an argument that something is misinformation, you should provide an actual argument. You can’t just take it down and say, ‘Oh, it’s misinformation’ without actually giving a reason. And saying, ‘Look it disagrees with the CDC’ is not enough of a reason. Let’s hear the argument, let’s see the evidence that YouTube used to decide it was misinformation. Let’s have a debate. Science works best when we have an open debate.”

[LISTEN: Sen. Ron Johnson Has Some Questions For The ‘Covid Gods’]

‘Rona Vaccines for Kids

In October 2021, Wisconsin radio host Dan O’Donnell’s YouTube account was suspended after he posted an interview with the senator about opposing vaccine mandates for kids.

We didn’t have to wait for ground-breaking scientific discovery on this one; we’ve known since the beginning of the pandemic that children are at almost zero risk of dying from coronavirus, and now we know that Covid shots don’t prevent people from contracting nor spreading the virus. Johnson was scientifically spot-on to oppose vaxx mandates for children, given children’s near-zero risk from a bout with Covid versus the potential risks of shot complications.

Hunter Biden

Corporate media ginned up all types of attacks when Johnson, as chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, dug into the Biden family corruption linked to Hunter Biden.

The New York Times described it using the “Russian disinformation” moniker. Time Magazine smeared him as the Senate’s “one-man Biden prosecutor.” And the Washington Post described Johnson’s investigation as a nakedly partisan ploy to get Donald Trump re-elected.

This was all a distraction from the fact that Johnson and Sen. Chuck Grassley successfully revealed millions of dollars in questionable financial transactions between Hunter Biden and his associates and foreign individuals, including the wife of the former mayor of Moscow and people with ties to the Chinese Communist Party.

Biden associate Tony Bobulinski confirmed aspects of the report after its release.

Climate Change

Johnson triggered the media in July when he mouthed to a Republican group that climate change is “bullsh-t.” The corporate media went berserk, with CNN and Chris Cuomo calling Johnson a climate change “denier.”

The senator has reinforced repeatedly that he doesn’t deny that the climate is changing, but rather that he isn’t an “alarmist” and doesn’t buy Democrats’ apocalyptic predictions.

Big surprise, plenty of data backs this up. The American Enterprise Institute has documented 50 years of failed doomsday predictions by so-called “experts” in the corrupt media and Democrat Party. For instance, ABC claimed in 2008 that Manhattan would be underwater by 2015. In 2011, The Washington Post claimed that cherry blossoms would bloom in winter.

Climate genius Al Gore also predicted in 2008 that five years later the North Pole would be free of ice. And in 2019, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., predicted that Miami would be underwater in a few years. Yet in 2022, Miami is still very much above ground.

Mouthwash

Last month, Johnson noted a number of simple things Americans can do to keep themselves heathy, such as taking Vitamin D, Vitamin C, and zinc, and gargling mouthwash to reduce viral load if they get COVID.

He was swiftly berated in print and on-air by the likes of MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow, HuffPost, The Washington Post, and Rolling Stone. Forbes said Johnson’s “Advice Exemplifies The Rising Tide Of Anti-Science,” and MSNBC’s Joy Reid called him a “fool” and a “public health menace.”

Johnson’s mouthwash claim about viral load is supported by scientific research, however, such as this study. Additionally, Dr. Bruce Davidson, a faculty member of the Georgetown Department of Otolaryngology, conducted a study on the use of antiseptic mouthwash to control coronavirus, published in the American Journal of Medicine, and found that mouthwash can help protect people from Covid-19 pneumonia.

JUST NOW: Ron Johnson, on a Wisconsin tele-town hall, pushes mouthwash as a COVID treatment.

"By the way, standard gargle, mouthwash, has been proven to kill the coronavirus. If you get it, you may reduce viral replication. Why not try all these things?" pic.twitter.com/V0cdxPYc7K
— Heartland Signal (@HeartlandSignal) December 8, 2021

Even FackCheck.org had to admit, “Johnson is right that mouthwashes ‘may’ reduce the virus’ ability to replicate in people.”

Natural Immunity

On July 14, Johnson claimed natural immunity is “as strong if not stronger than vaccinated immunity,” against which WaPo deployed its fake fact-checkers.

“Fact-checker” Salvador Rizzo gave it “four Pinocchios” (an analysis that Johnson’s team eviscerated), and WaPo’s bogus fact-checker-in-chief Glenn Kessler called it one of the “Biggest Pinocchios of 2021.”

Johnson’s claims, however, come straight out of a pair of studies that confirmed natural immunity is stronger than COVID vaccine-acquired immunity. The pre-print Israeli study found that people with natural immunity could be 13 times less likely to contract the virus than those who were solely vaccinated, contradicting CDC findings.

Martin Kulldorff, an epidemiologist and biostatistician who was a professor at Harvard Medical School for a decade, dissected and compared the CDC study and the Israeli pre-print and explained why the latter is more reliable.

Russiagate

Johnson’s years-long involvement in getting to the bottom of the Russia hoax and the Ukraine phone call impeachment is enough to fill a book (see here, here, here, here, here, and here), but suffice it to say that, true to form, the media were relentless, and the right was pretty much right about everything. In fact, the truth about that story is likely far worse than most have heard. Here’s hoping Johnson continues to pursue that truth using the powers of a U.S. senator.

Kylee Zempel is an assistant editor at The Federalist. She previously worked as the copy editor for the Washington Examiner magazine and as an editor and producer at National Geographic. She holds a B.S. in Communication Arts/Speech and an A.S. in Criminal Justice and writes on topics including feminism and gender issues, religious liberty, and criminal justice. Follow her on Twitter @kyleezempel.

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Biden Falsely Claims Intel Community Has Cleared His Family Of Wrongdoing

OCTOBER 21, 2020 By Jordan Davidson

Without any evidence, Democratic Nominee Joe Biden claimed that the “vast majority” of the intelligence community agrees there is “no basis at all” for the allegations of corruption against him and his son Hunter Biden.

“And, you know, and all and the vast majority of the intelligence people have come out and said, there’s no basis at all,” Biden claimed.

Despite his baseless claims, the intelligence community has weighed in on the potentially incriminating evidence presented by the New York Post and others who obtained information from a laptop hard drive reportedly belonging to Hunter Biden.

On Tuesday, the FBI and Department of Justice (DOJ) agreed with Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe Tuesday that the information released about Biden and his son Hunter is not a Russian disinformation campaign.

“Let me be clear,” Ratcliffe said on Fox Business, debunking Rep. Adam Schiff’s baseless claims of foreign election interference. “The intelligence community doesn’t believe that because there is no intelligence that supports that.”

The FBI is also in possession of the laptop.

Despite these claims, Biden continued to criticize the spread of this damning evidence, calling it a “last-ditch effort in this desperate campaign to smear me and my family.”

“This is the same garbage [as] Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s henchmen,” Biden said.

Biden’s comments come after Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, Chair of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, released a statement “on Homeland Security letterhead” claiming that Hunter and the Biden family were profiting from “the Biden name.”

A Senate report released in late September outlined “a long list of the Biden family’s conflicts of interest conducting shady overseas business activity with foreign adversaries while serving at the upper echelons of government, raising significant national security concerns with potentially criminal conduct and threats of extortion.”

Johnson reiterated his position on the issue to Sean Hannity on Fox News Monday night, expressing his concern that the mainstream media was not covering the scandal properly.

“Hunter Biden, together with other Biden family members, profited off the Biden name. That’s what’s happening here,” he said. “What we revealed in our 87-page report is a vast web of connections with Chinese nationals, with people all over the world. Again, trading on the Biden name.”

“But it’s these business dealings – you know, our report raises far more questions than it actually answered – but it raises so my troubling issues that the mainstream media is simply not looking at,” Johnson added. “They are suppressing the information, which is a scandal in and of itself.”

In response, Biden said that “Ron should be ashamed of himself” and referred to GOP outsider Sen. Mitt Romney’s denial of these claims. Romney has historically opposed his Republican colleagues on multiple contentious issues including endorsing the Democrats’ campaign to attempt to impeach Trump.

“Even the man who served with him on that committee, a former nominee for the Republican Party, said there’s no basis to this,” Biden said.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Jordan Davidson is a staff writer at The Federalist. She graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism.

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Senate Panel Is Investigating Contents Of Hunter Biden’s Alleged Computer Drive

Reported by CHUCK ROSS, INVESTIGATIVE REPORTER | October 14, 20203:48 PM ET

Artists And Athletes Alliance Inaugural Honors Service Nation (Photo by Logan Mock-Bunting/Getty Images)

A Senate committee is trying to verify the contents of a computer hard drive purported to belong to Hunter Biden.
A spokesman for the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee said that a confidential source contacted the panel last month regarding the hard drive.
The New York Post reported earlier on Wednesday that the owner of a computer store in Delaware had provided the newspaper with documents from the hard drive.
Emails on the device purportedly show Hunter Biden discussing his work for Burisma Holdings, a Ukrainian energy firm.

A Senate committee is investigating the contents of a computer hard drive that allegedly belonged to Hunter Biden, and which reportedly contains emails related to Ukrainian energy firm Burisma Holdings. The Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee (HSGAC) is attempting to validate the information from the hard drive, which was turned over to the panel last month by the owner of a computer repair shop in Delaware.

“Although we consider communications sent to our whistleblower account confidential, given that the individual spoke with the media about his contact with the committee, we can confirm receipt of his email complaint,” an HSGAC spokesman told The Daily Caller News Foundation.

“We are in the process of attempting to validate the information he provided.”

Investigators for the committee met with the shop owner on Oct. 5, according to The New York Post.

The New York Post published a series of stories earlier on Wednesday from documents on the alleged Biden hard drive. According to the newspaper, the repairman said that a person dropped off the computer for repair in April 2019 but never came to retrieve it.

Federal prosecutors issued a subpoena for the device in December 2019, according to the Post. The repairman said he made a copy of the hard drive before providing it to prosecutors and shared it with a lawyer for Rudy Giuliani. (RELATED: Report: Joe Biden Met With Son’s Ukrainian Business Partner, According To Unconfirmed Emails)

Giuliani, who has conducted a private investigation into the Bidens’ activities in Ukraine, turned the contents of the device over to The Post on Sunday, according to the newspaper. Steve Bannon, a former strategist for Donald Trump, also told The Post about the hard drive last month.

Bannon was indicted on Aug. 20 on fraud charges related to a fundraiser for a group that claimed to want to build a wall on the southern U.S. border.

Giuliani is also reportedly under investigation because of his ties to two businessmen he worked with to dig up dirt on the Bidens and Ukraine.

Giuliani, a personal lawyer for President Trump, also met in December 2019 with Arkady Derkach, a Ukrainian parliamentarian who has been sanctioned by the U.S. government because of his ties to the Russian government.

Emails from the computer, if verified, would provide new details about Hunter Biden’s work for Burisma Holdings. Hunter Biden had joined the board of directors of Burisma in April 2014. Joe Biden had just taken over as the Obama administration’s chief liaison to Ukraine following its Maidan Revolution.

Republicans, led by Giuliani, have alleged that Joe Biden intervened to help Burisma because of his son’s position with the company. Burisma’s owner, Mykola Zlochevsky, had been under investigation for bribery in the United Kingdom.

The elder Biden has denied discussing business with his son.

According to the Post, a Burisma executive named Vadym Pozharsky emailed Hunter Biden in December 2015 thanking him for an “opportunity” to meet Joe Biden.

The Biden campaign issued a statement on Wednesday saying that his calendar entries do not show a meeting with Pozharsky.

The computer repairman contacted the Senate committee a day after the panel released a report about Hunter Biden’s business activities, according to The Post. The report, released on Sept. 23, cited a series of wire transfers from foreigners to bank accounts and businesses controlled by Hunter Biden and his business partners. Some of the transactions were flagged as suspicious by banking regulators, according to the Senate report. One wire transfer was a $3.5 million transfer from Elena Baturina, a Russian billionaire whose husband was the mayor of Moscow through 2010.

Ye Jianming, the founder of CEFC China Energy Co., also wired hundreds of thousands of dollars to Biden’s accounts, according to the Senate report. Ye has been linked to China Association for International Friendly Contacts (CAIFC), a front group for the People’s Liberation Army.

Republicans on the panel said that Biden’s foreign relationships posed a counterintelligence risk.

Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson, the chairman of HSGAC, said that the report of Hunter Biden’s computer drive “raises more questions that must be resolved.”

“There are so many red flags about the Biden family trying to cash in on the Vice President’s position that it can be hard to keep them straight,” he said in a statement provided to the DCNF.

“What we know for a fact is that Hunter Biden took millions of dollars from foreign nationals including, the wife of the former Mayor of Moscow, people tied to the Chinese Communist Party and other unsavory characters.”

“Joe Biden needs to finally come clean and tell the truth to the American people about all of these issues, and he needs to do it now.”

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Senate Panel Approves Subpoenas For ‘Spygate’ Figure Stefan Halper, 40 Others

Reported by REUTERS/Erin Schaff | CHUCK ROSS, INVESTIGATIVE REPORTER | September 16, 202011:13 AM ET

URL of the originating web site: https://dailycaller.com/2020/09/16/ron-johnson-subpoena-stefan-halper/

Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Ron Johnson questions Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen during a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing on “Authorities and Resources Needed to Protect and Secure the United States,” on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, U.S., May 15, 2018. REUTERS/Erin Schaff

A Senate committee voted along party lines on Wednesday to authorize depositions and subpoenas for 41 individuals as part of a review of the Trump-Russia investigation. The vote authorizes Sen. Ron Johnson, the Republican chairman of the Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, to subpoena Stefan Halper, a former University of Cambridge professor who served as a confidential source for the FBI during Crossfire Hurricane, the name of the Trump-Russia counterintelligence investigation.

The committee also approved issuing a subpoena for Steven Somma, an FBI counterintelligence investigator who served as Halper’s handling agent. A Justice Department inspector general’s report released on Dec. 9 faulted Somma for numerous errors during Crossfire Hurricane.

The Senate committee voted in June to issue subpoenas for 35 people on Johnson’s witness wish list, but Democrats raised a procedural issue that required a new vote on Wednesday. (RELATED: GOP Senator Seeks Subpoena For ‘Spygate’ Professor)

Michigan Sen. Gary Peters, the top Democrat on HSAGC, voiced his opposition to the subpoenas ahead of the vote on Wednesday. He accused Johnson of leading a politically-motivated investigation aimed at helping President Donald Trump.

FILE PHOTO: Former FBI Director James Comey is sworn in prior to testifying before a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on Russia’s alleged interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., June 8, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst/Files

The committee voted eight to six to authorize the subpoenas.

Johnson has sought interviews with former FBI officials who led Crossfire Hurricane, including James Comey, Andrew McCabe, James Baker, Peter Strzok and Lisa Page.

He is also seeking depositions for former CIA Director John Brennan and former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper.

Also on the list are Cody Shearer and Sidney Blumenthal, two longtime Clinton allies who circulated a dossier that accused Donald Trump of illicit sex acts in Russia. The allegations are similar to those in the dossier by former British spy Christopher Steele.

Jonathan Winer, a former State Department official, obtained the so-called Shearer dossier from Blumenthal, and in turn shared it with Steele. Steele passed the report to the FBI.

Johnson also plans to subpoena Winer as part of his investigation.

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McConnell tries to unify GOP

Reported BY ALEXANDER BOLTON – 09/09/20 06:00 AM EDT

URL of the originating web site: https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/515578-mcconnell-tries-to-unify-gop

Friction among Senate Republicans on the next round of coronavirus relief legislation and a suddenly shaky stock market has eroded President Trump’s leverage in the ongoing standoff with Democrats. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) was still searching Tuesday afternoon for 51 Republican votes for a half-trillion-dollar economic relief package that he hopes will put pressure on Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) to soften their demands.

Meanwhile, the stock markets in the past week have suffered their worst one-day drops since the coronavirus first froze the U.S. economy in March. On Tuesday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 dropped 632 points and 95 points, respectively — more than 2 percent each — while the tech-heavy Nasdaq composite dropped 465 points, or 4.11 percent.

While the stock markets surged upward through July and August, the start of September has brought a stark shift in sentiment. Coronavirus infections are expected to spike when the fall temperatures drop and there doesn’t appear to be a clear path to getting another federal relief package.

“Trump needs a package just because the stock market has been declining. There is a possibility that COVID infections will increase in the fall and we know the economy is a big variable in how people vote,” said Darrell West, director of governance studies at the Brookings Institution.

“Republicans want to protect the Senate and protect the presidency and they’re going to need a deal,” he said.

Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell warned Congress during testimony in June that “significant uncertainty” remained in the economy and that “support would be well-placed at this time.” The recent big drop in the stock indices is a significant political development because Trump often cites Wall Street to argue that the economy is making a strong recovery.

“The Dow Jones Industrial just closed above 29,000! You are so lucky to have me as your President. With Joe Hiden’ it would crash,” Trump tweeted exuberantly on Sept. 2, just before the markets started tumbling.

Another relief package passed by Congress, especially one as large as what Pelosi and Schumer want, is expected to give another boost to the markets.

“You live by the sword and you die by the sword. If you’re claiming credit when the market is high, you have a problem when the market drops,” West said.

One Republican senator who wants a larger relief bill said the market turmoil “ought to” put pressure on the White House and colleagues to agree to more federal aid. But the lawmaker, who requested anonymity to discuss Trump’s motives, conceded “I’m having trouble mapping out a scenario one way or another.”

Pelosi on Tuesday seized on calls by Fed officials for more fiscal stimulus from Congress as well as divisions among Republicans to press her growing leverage.

“The chairman of the Fed and other Fed leaders around the country have said clearly that we need a stimulus, that we need a boost,” she noted in an interview with Bloomberg’s “Balance of Power.”

At the same time she slammed McConnell’s revised relief bill, which is estimated to cost around a half-trillion dollars, as “pathetic.” She pointed out it is roughly “half of what [Treasury] Secretary [Steven] Mnuchin has proposed.”

“They are not even in agreement. They are in disarray,” she said of Republicans.

The Senate Republican bill needs 60 votes to overcome an anticipated Democratic filibuster and pass. It will fall well short of that threshold, but McConnell is hoping to get at least a simple majority in favor of it so he can argue that Democrats are acting as obstructionists.

He said on the Senate floor Tuesday that he will schedule a vote this week and indicated to reporters in the hallway that it would happen Thursday.

“Republicans are making yet another overture,” McConnell said.

Conservatives such as Sens. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), Rand Paul (R-Ky.), Mike Lee (R-Utah) and Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) are skeptical about spending hundreds of billions of dollars in more federal aid and are pushing for concessions from the GOP leadership. With all Democrats likely to oppose the Republican bill, McConnell can only afford three defections.

Paul on Tuesday said he would oppose the measure.

“We don’t have any money up here. I’m not for borrowing any more money,” he said.

Johnson on Tuesday afternoon said he would support the bill after McConnell and Mnuchin agreed to repurpose about $350 billion in funding from the $2.2 trillion CARES Act passed in March to new relief measures. He said the revised bill would add only $150 billion to $300 billion to the deficit, though he cautioned the numbers aren’t final yet. Johnson said he worked closely with the GOP leadership and Mnuchin to make changes to the measure to make it more appealing to conservatives but didn’t know if it would get 51 votes.

“We’ll see what all ends up happening. We’ll probably have a discussion. There might be some further arm twisting,” he said.

Hawley, a rising conservative star, is pressing for a fully refundable tax credit for homeschooling expenses such as books, technology and laboratory equipment. His proposal was not in the bill as of Tuesday afternoon and he remains undecided. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) used his leverage with Republican leaders to gain two years of tax credits for individuals and businesses that donate to nonprofit scholarship funds, a proposal designed to help subsidize private school tuition.

There are also questions as to whether more-moderate Republicans in tough reelection races such as Sens. Susan Collins (Maine) and Cory Gardner (Colo.) will be satisfied with the smaller price tag for the revised package, and the lack of additional federal aid for state and local governments, other than money set aside for schools.

Without the repurposed federal funding offsetting some of its cost, the package would be in the range of $500 billion to $700 billion, according to Senate GOP aides. The Republican bill, which McConnell unveiled Tuesday, would provide $300 a week in federal unemployment assistance, a second round of Paycheck Protection Program loans, $105 billion to help reopen classrooms and $16 billion in more money for COVID-19 testing.

Failure to win a simple majority vote for a largely symbolic bill would be another setback for the White House and Senate Republicans, who declined to put the $1.1 trillion coronavirus relief proposal they drafted in July on the Senate floor because of divisions within their conference. Plans to vote during the first week of August on proposals to extend federal unemployment assistance and to fund a second round of small-business loans were scrapped after disagreements again broke out among Republican senators.

Democrats, however, have stayed unified behind their own proposal, the $3.4 trillion HEROES Act, which the House passed in May, as well as a trimmed-down $2.2 trillion proposal that Pelosi and Schumer offered to White House negotiators in late August.

Pelosi and Schumer on Monday said McConnell’s bill was “headed nowhere” and dismissed it as a “political” gesture.

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Grassley, Johnson Renew Inquiry into Democrat Efforts to Seek Dirt from Ukraine on Trump in 2016

Posted by Steven Ahle : October 2, 2019

URL of the original posting site: https://steadfastandloyal.com/politics/grassley-johnson-renew-inquiry-into-democrat-efforts-to-seek-dirt-from-ukraine-on-trump-in-2016/

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Ron Johnson (R-WI) have written a letter to Attorney General Bill Barr requesting information on documents Ukraine has been trying to give over to the Department of Justice detailing Democratic efforts to dig up dirt on Donald Trump and his campaign team.

They plan on reopening their investigations into the origin of the Trump/Russia hoax. They will be looking into Alexandra Chalupa, who the DNC sent to Ukraine to gather up the dirt they were trying to supply the Clinton campaign.

From Breitbart News

Grassley and Johnson wrote in the letter:

Ukrainian efforts, abetted by a U.S. political party, to interfere in the 2016 election should not be ignored. Such allegations of corruption deserve due scrutiny, and the American people have a right to know when foreign forces attempt to undermine our democratic processes.

Their letter follows a previous July 2017 letter from Grassley, then-Senate Judiciary Committee chairman, to the DOJ referencing reports that then-DNC contractor Alexandra Chalupa worked with the Ukrainian government to obtain opposition research on Trump during the 2016 election.

Grassley cited a January 2017 Politico report that said, “Ukrainian government officials tried to help Hillary Clinton and undermine Trump,” and “helped Clinton’s allies research damaging information on Trump and his advisers.”

In addition, Grassley and Johnson asked whether the Justice Department has acquired information from Ukrainian prosecutors that may contradict Vice President Joe Biden’s claim that he pressured Ukraine to fire its chief prosecutor because he was corrupt, and not because he was investigating a company in Ukraine that hired his son based on a report.

According to a press release on their letter:

A report yesterday revealed new documents that call into question the stated reasons behind a 2016 ultimatum by then Vice-President Biden to fire a Ukrainian prosecutor who had investigated a company for which Biden’s son was a board member. According to the report, Ukrainian officials have tried to forward documents related to the matter to the department, to no avail. Grassley and Johnson are requesting details on any actions the department is taking to review the material referenced in the report,” according to a press release on their letter.

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House passes sweeping tax bill in huge victory for GOP

Reported By Naomi Jagoda and Cristina Marcos – 11/16/17 01:48 PM

URL of the original posting site: http://thehill.com/homenews/house/360704-house-passes-sweeping-tax-bill-in-victory-for-gop

The House on Thursday passed legislation to overhaul the tax code, moving Republicans one step closer to achieving the top item on their legislative agenda. The measure was approved by a vote of 227-205. No Democrats voted for the bill, while 13 Republicans broke ranks to oppose it.

“Passing this bill is the single biggest thing we can do to grow the economy, to restore opportunity and help these middle-income families who are struggling,” Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) said ahead of the vote.

Once the bill reached the magic number for passage, Republicans in the chamber erupted into applause. Democrats mockingly joined in, with some singing “na na na na, hey hey, goodbye,” like they did when the chamber passed an ObamaCare repeal bill earlier this year.

Besides Rep. Walter Jones (R-N.C.), who had concerns about the bill’s impact on the debt, all of the GOP no votes came from the states of New York, New Jersey and California.

Opposing the bill were New York Reps. Dan Donovan, John Faso, Pete Kingc, Elise Stefanik and Lee Zeldin; New Jersey Reps. Rodney Frelinghuysen , Leonard Lance , Frank LoBiondo and Chris Smith, and California Reps. Darrell Issa , Tom McClintock

Passage of the tax bill, which was unveiled just two weeks ago, was relatively drama-free compared to the GOP’s failed effort to repeal ObamaCare earlier this year.

The stakes are high for Republicans, who are feeling pressure to show that they can govern ahead of next year’s midterm elections. The Democratic wave in last week’s gubernatorial and state house elections in Virginia and New Jersey has only added to their anxiety.

GOP leaders are hoping to get legislation to President Trump’s desk by Christmas, an ambitious timeline given the obstacles that are mounting in the Senate.

Ahead of the House vote, Trump visited the Capitol to rally the House GOP conference in support of the bill. The president and his economic advisers have touted tax reform as the key to unlocking economic growth.

The measure approved Thursday would reduce the number of individual tax brackets, slash the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 20 percent and eliminate a number of tax breaks and deductions.

The Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) estimated that the bill would lower federal revenues by about $1.4 trillion over 10 years — a key finding, as the Republican budget only allows lawmakers to add $1.5 trillion to the debt during that time.

JCT said that all income groups would see a tax cut on average under the bill in 2019, but that some income groups, particularly those making $20,000 to $50,000, in some future years would see tax increases on average.

House Republicans who have labored for months on the tax bill celebrated the vote on Thursday, saying the GOP is on track to put more money in people’s pockets and spur investment in new jobs.

“For too long, this broken tax code has eroded America’s economic leadership around the world,” said House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady (R-Texas), the chief architect of the legislation.

Democrats denounced the bill, saying it mostly benefit wealthy individuals and corporations while increasing taxes on some in the middle class.

Rep. John Yarmuth (D-Ky.), the top Democrat on the House Budget Committee, brought a giant check to the House floor debate giving $500 billion to “The Wealthiest 1%” from “The American Taxpayers.” The fake check was signed, “Congressional Republicans.”

“Hard-working families get pocket change,” Yarmuth said, holding up a handful of coins for emphasis. “But millions don’t even get that.”

The House bill would eliminate the deduction for state and local income and sales taxes and cap the property-tax deduction at $10,000, which could hurt people in high-tax states like New York, New Jersey and California.

“I just have too many constituents who are going to see their taxes go up or not see the benefit of the tax relief,” Zeldin said.

Senate Republicans have their own tax bill, which is currently being considered by the chamber’s tax-writing committee. The Senate legislation differs from the House’s in a number of ways. Unlike the House bill, the Senate bill fully repeals the state and local tax deduction, delays the corporate tax cut until 2019 and repeals ObamaCare’s individual mandate. The Senate’s bill also sunsets tax cuts for individuals after 2025, in order to comply with the “Byrd rule” that the measure can’t increase the deficit after 10 years if it is to pass with a simple majority.

No more than two Senate Republicans can vote against their bill if Democrats are united in opposition to it. Already, Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) has said he doesn’t support either the House or the Senate bills because they provide more of a benefit to corporations than to other types of businesses. Sen. Susan Collins(R-Maine) has expressed concerns about including repeal of the individual mandate, but has not taken a hard stance yet on the measure.

Senate Republicans are aiming to vote on their tax plan during the week after the Thanksgiving holiday.

If the Senate passes its bill, it will set up a difficult conference negotiation between the two chambers over the final legislation.

– This story was updated at 2:15 p.m.

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Cruz, DeSantis push for congressional term limits

Authored By Jordain Carney – 01/03/17

URL of the original posting site: http://thehill.com/blogs/floor-action/senate/312571-cruz-desantis-push-for-congressional-term-limits

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Rep. Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.) are pushing for an amendment to the Constitution to place term limits on lawmakers, arguing the move will help overhaul Washington.

“The American people resoundingly agreed on Election Day, and President-elect Donald Trump has committed to putting government back to work for the American people,” Cruz said in a statement on Tuesday. “It is well past time to put an end to the cronyism and deceit that has transformed Washington into a graveyard of good intentions.”

Under an amendment the two GOP lawmakers filed on Tuesday, House members would be allowed to serve three two-year terms and senators would be able to serve two six-year terms.

DeSantis added that the measure would be a “first step toward reforming Capitol Hill.”

GOP Sens. Deb Fischer (Neb.), Ron Johnson (Wis.), Thom Tillis (N.C.), Marco Rubio (Fla.), Mike Lee (Utah) and David Perdue (Ga.) are backing the proposal. Cruz and DeSantis previously pledged in a Washington Post op-ed to introduce the measure this year.

According to the resolution, any congressional term before the amendment becomes law wouldn’t be taken into account when determining if a lawmaker can run for reelection or not. Trump backed term limits during his White House run, but the measure could face an uphill battle in Congress.

Neither House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), who has said he supports term limits, nor Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has signaled it could come up for a vote. McConnell appeared to shut down Trump’s push after the election, telling reporters, “We have term limits — they’re called elections.”

In addition to clearing Congress, the Cruz-DeSantis proposal would also need to be ratified by three-fourths of state legislatures before going into effect.

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Reported By Naomi Jagoda and Cristina Marcos – 11/16/17 01:48 PM

The House on Thursday passed legislation to overhaul the tax code, moving Republicans one step closer to achieving the top item on their legislative agenda. The measure was approved by a vote of 227-205. No Democrats voted for the bill, while 13 Republicans broke ranks to oppose it.

“Passing this bill is the single biggest thing we can do to grow the economy, to restore opportunity and help these middle-income families who are struggling,” Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) said ahead of the vote.

“For too long, this broken tax code has eroded America’s economic leadership around the world,” said House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady (R-Texas), the chief architect of the legislation.

“Hard-working families get pocket change,” Yarmuth said, holding up a handful of coins for emphasis. “But millions don’t even get that.”

“I just have too many constituents who are going to see their taxes go up or not see the benefit of the tax relief,” Zeldin said.

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Authored By Jordain Carney – 01/03/17

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Rep. Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.) are pushing for an amendment to the Constitution to place term limits on lawmakers, arguing the move will help overhaul Washington.

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