House Republicans to open Joe Biden impeachment inquiry
While some hard-right Republicans are eager to impeach, other party members cite lack of evidence
U.S. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said Tuesday he is directing a House committee to open a formal impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden over his family's business dealings.
McCarthy said the House investigation has found a "culture of corruption" around the Biden family. The announcement from the Republican leader comes as he faces mounting pressure from a hardline faction of his party to take action against Biden. Members such as Marjorie Taylor Greene and Matt Gaetz, representatives from Georgia and Florida, respectively, have been among those pushing for an inquiry.
McCarthy said he did not come to the decision lightly and that the inquiry would "go where the evidence takes us."
"The American people deserve to know that public offices are not for sale," he said.
Since gaining control of the House last November, Republicans have made the overseas business dealings of the president's son, Hunter Biden, a focus of multiple committees. Hunter Biden earned significant money in Ukraine and China through business dealings while his father was vice-president.
Some members of McCarthy's party, including Ken Buck of Colorado and Don Bacon of Illinois, have said it is premature to push for an impeachment inquiry, citing a lack of evidence tying the president to any corruption or to his son's business activities.
McCarthy is launching the inquiry on his own, without a House vote, as he may not not have enough support from his slim Republican majority for approval.
That didn't stop several members from expressing approval on social media about the inquiry, including New Jersey's Jeff Van Drew, who was a Democrat until switching parties in 2019.
"The allegations are staggering and the evidence is mounting against Joe Biden," said Van Drew. "I fully supported an impeachment inquiry months ago, and I fully support it now."
An inquiry is step toward impeachment, and McCarthy essentially outlined the potential charges. He is planning to convene lawmakers behind closed doors this week to discuss the Biden impeachment, and top House chairmen are heading Wednesday to brief the Senate.
Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell has warned House Republicans off the effort, but said Tuesday: "I don't think Speaker McCarthy needs advice from the Senate."
'Illusions of access'
Republicans have shown a few instances, largely during the time the elder Biden was Barack Obama's vice-president, when Biden spoke by phone with his son and stopped by dinners his son was hosting with business partners.
Devin Archer, Hunter Biden's former business partner, testified before a House committee this summer that the younger Biden sold the "illusion of access" to his father by taking credit for things his dad did as vice-president.
Archer testified that over the span of 10 years, Hunter Biden put his father on the phone around 20 times while in the company of associates, but "never once spoke about any business dealings."
The White House has insisted Joe Biden was not involved in his son's business dealings and has dismissed the impeachment push as politically motivated.
"Speaker McCarthy shouldn't cave to the extreme, far-right members who are threatening to shut down the government unless they get a baseless, evidence-free impeachment of President Biden. The consequences for the American people are too serious," White House spokesperson Ian Sams has said.
Democrats slam impeachment bid
The impeachment push comes as former president Donald Trump faces more serious charges in court. As well, Trump was impeached for pressuring Ukraine to help damage Joe Biden in exchange for U.S. military aid.
"This is a transparent effort to boost Donald Trump's campaign by establishing a false moral equivalency [to] Trump — the four time-indicted former president," said Rep. Jamie Raskin, the top Democrat on the House's oversight committee.
Raskin in recent weeks has questioned Republican sincerity on the issue of corruption. He has said Democrats will seek to find out more information on how Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner secured a $2 billion US investment from a Saudi-led fund not long after leaving his role as White House adviser, a role in which Kushner communicated with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman regularly.
Rep. James Comer, the Republican chairman leading the House's oversight committee, is digging deeper into the Biden family finances and is expected to seek banking records for Hunter Biden as the panel tries to follow the flow of money.
On Tuesday, Comer demanded the State Department produce documents about the work Biden did as vice-president during the Obama administration to clean up corruption in Ukraine. Comer wants to understand the State Department's views of former Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin, whom Biden and many Western allies wanted removed from office because of allegations of corruption.
Reaction from Democratic House member Ritchie Torres:
House Republicans just announced a kangaroo "impeachment inquiry" against President Biden.<br><br>The latest MAGA shenanigan is nothing more than a political persecution pretending to be a prosecution. Since the House GOP cannot find an actual presidential crime, it will invent one out…
—@RitchieTorresBefore Trump — who also impeached after the 2021 Capitol riot for incitement of insurrection — the only U.S. presidents to have been impeached in the House were Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton. No president has ever been convicted at a Senate trial and removed from office.
In the event that the Republicans were able to marshal enough votes to impeach Joe Biden, the Democrats control the Senate, making the two-thirds majority threshold for a conviction a virtual impossibility.
Hunter Biden has been under criminal investigation for several years, with U.S. Attorney David Weiss of Delaware recently elevated to the role of special counsel to continue the probe. In a recent plea deal that fell through, the focus was on Hunter Biden's income tax filing and gun possession, not his overseas business dealings.
The president's son has written about how drug addiction derailed his life and impacted his decision-making for several years.
Little impact on voters, predicts former prosecutor
Former U.S. federal prosecutor Joseph Moreno doesn't believe the inquiry will have much impact on voters. He points to Weiss's investigation and says if there had been something more to be found on the Biden family, he likely would have found it.
"Unless this impeachment inquiry turns up something that's so explosive and something new that we haven't seen before, I think it's the status quo," Moreno told CBC News Network.
"And if anything, you might see people annoyed that the Republicans in the House are doing this rather than focusing on things like the economy or immigration or health care or energy."
Some Republicans contend the Justice Department has not fully probed the allegations against Hunter Biden, and say he received preferential treatment in that plea deal that recently collapsed.
With files from CBC News