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Kathianne
06-26-2023, 11:54 AM
I don't know how much more cynical I can be regarding our failing system. Frankly, I despair of any righting of the ship. Contrary to what many are saying, it is being documented and even with some pushback, but as I said, turning it around seems impossible. On this question of whom to believe I know which I'm believing:

https://jonathanturley.org/2023/06/26/who-is-lying-merrick-garland-or-the-whistleblowers/


June 26, 2023Who is Lying? Merrick Garland or the Whistleblowers?
Below is my column in the Hill on the growing controversy surrounding the investigation of Hunter Biden. I previously wrote on the failure of Attorney General Merrick Garland to restore public trust in his department. This is far more serious. Someone is lying. The allegations raised against the Department now have potentially criminal and impeachable elements. As such, the authority of Congress to investigate is at its apex. If U.S. Attorney General David Weiss was denied the ability to bring charges in two other jurisdictions and was denied a request for special counsel status, Garland’s past statements to Congress stand contradicted. Alternatively, these whistleblowers (who offered detailed accounts, including the names of other witnesses) have lied to Congress. Even if past statements are untrue or misleading, Garland may not be aware of contradictions given his seemingly shrinking presence at Justice. Despite the unanimous vote opposition of Democratic members on the Committee, the House must move forward and demand answers from Garland, Weiss, and others. It should also finally call in Hunter Biden, if necessary under compulsion, to end the obfuscation over these messages. The solution to what I have called the “seven-percent solution” is a congressional subpoena.


Here is the column:




“I’m not the deciding official.”


Those five words, allegedly from Delaware U.S. Attorney David Weiss, shocked IRS and FBI investigators in a meeting on October 22, 2022. This is because, in refusing to appoint a special counsel, Attorney Garland Merrick Garland had repeatedly assured the public and Congress that Weiss had total authority over his investigation.


IRS supervisory agent Gary A. Shapley Jr. told Congress he was so dismayed by Weiss’s statement and other admissions that he memorialized them in a communication to other team members.


Shapley and another whistleblower detail what they describe as a pattern of interference with their investigation of Hunter Biden, including the denial of searches, lines of questioning, and even attempted indictments.


The only thing abundantly clear is that someone is lying. Either these whistleblowers are lying to Congress, or these Justice Department officials (including Garland) are lying.


The response from both Hunter Biden’s counsel and the attorney general himself only deepened the concerns.


Christopher Clark, an attorney for Hunter Biden, responded to a shocking Whatsapp message that the president’s son had allegedly sent to a Chinese official with foreign intelligence contacts who was funneling millions to him.


“I am sitting here with my father,” the younger Biden wrote, “and we would like to understand why the commitment made has not been fulfilled. Tell the director that I would like to resolve this now before it gets out of hand, and now means tonight. And, Z, if I get a call or text from anyone involved in this other than you, Zhang, or the chairman, I will make certain that between the man sitting next to me and every person he knows and my ability to forever hold a grudge that you will regret not following my direction. I am sitting here waiting for the call with my father.”


President Biden has repeatedly told the public that he had no knowledge or involvement in his son’s dealings. He maintained the denial despite audiotapes of him referring to business dealings, photos and meetings with his son’s business associates, as well as an eyewitness account of an in-person meeting.


Clark did not deny that the above-quoted message had been sent. He only said that it was “illegal” to release the text (he did not explain why) and then added that “[a]ny verifiable words or actions of my client in the midst of a horrible addiction are solely his own and have no connection to anyone in his family.”


Most of us expected a simple denial. Yet, after five years, Hunter has never even denied that the laptop was his. His team has continued with the same non-denial denials.


The transcript also details how investigators wanted to confirm the authenticity of the Whatsapp message through the company. The Justice Department reportedly shut down that effort.


If Hunter Biden was evasive, Garland was irate. He denounced the allegations as “an attack on an institution that is essential to American democracy, and essential to the safety of the American people.”


The statement bordered on delusion. Polls show that a majority of the public now views the Justice Department as politically compromised and even engaged in election interference. The level of trust in the department under Garland is now lower than it was under his predecessor, Bill Barr.


These questions are not an attack on the institution, but on what some are doing with it. Garland’s reaction is akin to doctors responding to malpractice lawsuits as attacks on medicine itself.


As in the past, Garland continued to insist that the public must trust him and his department, because “You’ve all heard me say many times that we make our cases based on the facts and the law.” Once again, he reminded citizens that “these are not just words. These are what we live by.”


For those us who once supported Garland’s nomination as Attorney General, it was another maddening moment. Garland has done little to change the view of his department or to address the political bias that has plagued it and the FBI for years. That record has resulted in blistering reports from the Inspector General and most recently Special Counsel John Durham.


Garland does have a motto. Yet, as these allegations pile up it is becoming more and more of a meaningless mantra.


The attorney general has a growing problem. For years, many of us have criticized him for his inexplicable refusal to appoint a Special Counsel on the Biden influence peddling scandal. Indeed, I have written over a dozen columns on why such an appointment seemed unavoidable, given the references to the president under various code names as a possible recipient of money and other benefits from foreign deals.


Even after a respected FBI source detailed allegations of a bribery scheme involving Ukrainian figures, Garland still refused to make the appointment. Such an appointment would not only expose Joe Biden to high-risk interviews, but would also allow the Special Counsel to issue a report on influence peddling by his family.


Garland was willing to appoint a Special Counsel to look into classified records found in Biden’s various offices, yet he continues to bar an appointment on major corruption allegations implicating the president.


It was impossible to investigate these matters without tripping over the president and other family members. The whistleblowers detailed repeated occasions in which they were told to back off.


Even the narrow tax issues addressed in Hunter’s recent plea bargain relate to those broader issues, given the source of these funds. Influence peddling may be lawful, but it is also corrupt. Indeed, it is the favorite form of corruption in Washington and a virtual family legacy of the Bidens.


It is the concealment of the corruption that often results in crimes, from false statements to tax evasion to unlawful financial transactions to unlawful work as an unregistered foreign agent.


The whistleblowers allege that the Justice Department consistently cut them off in seeking searches or answers related to President Biden. However, the line that stood out the most was this: “U.S. Attorney Weiss stated that he subsequently asked for special counsel authority from Main DOJ at that time and was denied that authority.”


If true, that means that Garland was not just hearing from experts and members of Congress calling for an appointment, but that Weiss himself also saw the need for such an appointment. Moreover, the report indicates that others in the investigation believed that there was a need to create such separation from the Justice Department in light of what they viewed as the special treatment given the president’s son.


These accounts could explain why the Justice Department took five years to secure a guilty plea to two misdemeanors that could have been established in the first month of the investigation.


It would explain why there is no evidence of serious investigation into the influence peddling or a charge under FARA. It would explain why Hunter’s lawyer cannot recall ever being asked about the laptop.


It would explain why the problem is not the Justice Department’s motto, but the man who is tasked with fulfilling it.


Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law for George Washington University.

Black Diamond
06-26-2023, 03:10 PM
Garland is a moderate Just ask Obama.

Tyr-Ziu Saxnot
06-26-2023, 04:35 PM
Garland is a moderate Just ask Obama.

Obama has an IQ a bit below average. What we used to call, he is a dumb son of a bitch.
And scheming doe not a higher IQ make my friend. Bamboy is a lying schemer. --Tyr

Gunny
06-26-2023, 04:41 PM
I don't know how much more cynical I can be regarding our failing system. Frankly, I despair of any righting of the ship. Contrary to what many are saying, it is being documented and even with some pushback, but as I said, turning it around seems impossible. On this question of whom to believe I know which I'm believing:

https://jonathanturley.org/2023/06/26/who-is-lying-merrick-garland-or-the-whistleblowers/

Barring a miracle at the polls that doesn't include Biden nor Trump, I don't see righting this ship. I see getting another POS for yet another 4 years because Donald won't just go home.

The DOJ is openly a politically partisan arm of the Dem party. They don't even try to hide it. They just say you're wrong and continue stabbing the corpse in front of our faces.

Kathianne
07-01-2023, 10:43 AM
Dum de dum dum:

https://hotair.com/ed-morrissey/2023/07/01/hunter-prosecutor-irs-whistleblower-is-telling-the-truth-n561925


Hunter prosecutor: IRS whistleblower is ... telling the truth?ED MORRISSEY 11:31 AM on July 01, 2023

And here we thought the State Department report on Joe Biden’s disgrace in Afghanistan was the long-holiday Friday night document dump. That turned out to only be an appetizer, however. US Attorney David Weiss, the man behind the very lenient and very convenient plea deal for Hunter Biden, finally responded to House Judiciary chair Jim Jordan’s demand for an answer to whistleblower accusations that he and Merrick Garland misled Congress on the extent of his authority and independence.


Weiss rebutted that claim by, er … admitting to it? Read for yourself:

...

Relevant portion transcribed below:


As the U.S. Attorney for the District of Delaware, my charging authority is 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 in the District of Columbia, the Central District of California, or any other district where charges could be brought in this matter.


That matches up a lot more closely to the claims from IRS whistleblowers Gary Shapley et al than to what Merrick Garland told Congress and the public. A week ago, Garland insisted that Weiss had already been granted that kind of authority (via Twitchy, see note at end):


“As I said at the outset, Mr. [David] Weiss, who was appointed by President [Donald] Trump as the U.S. Attorney in Delaware and assigned this matter during a previous administration, would be permitted to continue his investigation and to make a decision to prosecute any way in which he wanted to and in any district in which he wanted to,” Garland said during a press conference at Justice Department headquarters about a crackdown on fentanyl precursors.


“I don’t know how it would be possible for anybody to block him from bringing a prosecution given that he has this authority,” Garland added. “He was given complete authority to make all decisions on his own.”


Apparently, that’s news to Weiss, who just told Jordan that he didn’t have that authority even now, let alone last October when he met with Shapley. That lines up with Shapley’s whistleblowing testimony, in which he claims that Weiss made clear in a meeting that he didn’t have final authority on charging decisions, and which others involved in the meeting and contemporaneous documentary evidence have corroborated. US Attorney for DC Michael Graves, a Biden appointee, refused to charge Hunter with any felonies. So did another US Attorney in central California, also appointed by Biden:


The next meeting was in person on October 7th, 2022, and it took place in the Delaware U.S. Attorney’s Office. This meeting included only senior-level managers from IRS CI, FBI, and the Delaware U.S. Attorney’s Office. This ended up being my red-line meeting in our investigation for me.


United States Attorney Weiss was present for the meeting. He surprised us by telling us on the charges, quote: “I’m not the deciding official on whether charges are filed,” unquote.


He then shocked us with the earth-shattering news that the Biden-appointed D.C. U.S. Attorney Matthew Graves would not allow him to charge in his district.


To add to the surprise, U.S. Attorney Weiss stated that he subsequently asked for special counsel authority from Main DOJ at that time and was denied that authority. Instead, he was told to follow the process, which was known to send U.S. Attorney Weiss through another President Biden-appointed U.S. Attorney.


This was troubling, because he stated that, if California does not support charging, he has no authority to charge in California. Because it had been denied, he informed us the government would not be bringing charges against Hunter Biden for the 2014-2015 tax years, for which the statute of limitations were set to expire in one month.


All of our years of effort getting to the bottom of the massive amounts of foreign money Hunter Biden received from Burisma and others during that period would be for nothing.


This point is critical. If Weiss actually had plenary charging authority as Garland claims, Hunter could have been charged with felonies just around the midterm elections (which took place on November 8, 2022, almost exactly a month after this meeting). Weiss couldn’t get either Biden-appointed US Attorney to partner with him on those charges, however. And either Weiss didn’t request Special Attorney status at that time, or Merrick Garland denied his request.


Instead, it looks like Weiss caved and cut a sweetheart plea deal to cut Hunter loose — and help keep the cover on the scandal through another election cycle.


Note well that this letter from Weiss also rebuts a new effort from Hunter Biden attorney Abbe Lowell to claim that these aren’t actual whistleblowers and that their testimony is false. Power Line’s Scott Johnson dissects that effort:


Further executing his “best defense” strategy this week on Hunter Biden’s behalf, Lowell sent a wild 10-page letter to House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith yesterday. The letter is posted online here. Lowell attacks congressional Republicans for their investigation of the Biden family business (that’s not how he puts it). He attacks the IRS whistleblowers whose testimony Smith released last week.


Lowell is all but swinging his arms in windmill fashion. He alleges, for example, that the Smith’s release of the transcripts “violated the spirit, if not the letter, of the tax laws and federal rules governing investigations[.]” So I take it that Smith didn’t violate any law releasing the transcripts.


The whistleblowers aren’t whistleblowers. They don’t understand the merits of the lenient deal Hunter Biden has arranged with prosecutors. They themselves are possibly guilty of illegal misconduct. And so on, and so on.


Scott has the response from Shapley’s attorneys too, which accuses Lowell of participating in an “intimidation” campaign. They make clear that Shapley et al will not get bullied:


These threats and intimidation have already been referred earlier this week to the inspectors general for DOJ and the IRS, and to Congress for further investigation as potential obstruction of their lawful inquiries as well as retaliation against our client.


It’s going to get tougher to keep up this offense while Weiss is stipulating to the facts in Shapley’s testimony. The next step is to get Merrick Garland under oath in a House hearing and force him to testify as to what authority Weiss actually had, when Weiss applied for §515 status (if he ever did), and why Garland has lied about Weiss’ status to the public and to Congress for the last two years. It might take a grant of immunity to Garland aides to force the truth out of the Department of Justice for their attempt to bury the Biden influence-peddling scandal — and to see just how high up the deceit and corruption actually go.


Note: Readers might recall Garland’s response last week came in the same press conference in which he claimed that questioning an AG or the DoJ is the same thing as undermining democracy. Now we can glimpse a reason for Garland’s panicked hyperbole; the whistleblowers are exposing the truth Garland’s corrupt administration of the DoJ.

Gunny
07-02-2023, 06:18 PM
Dum de dum dum:

:laugh2:

SassyLady
07-03-2023, 11:07 AM
At least some journalists are beginning to ask questions about it. Tiny step forward.

Kathianne
07-06-2023, 09:58 AM
Uncovering a coverup?

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2023/07/06/hunter-bidens-lawyers-latest-pivot-on-irs-whistleblowers-blew-up-in-their-faces-n2625362