Mike Johnson Tries Saving GOP’s Biggest Lie on Hunter Biden and Trump

It seems that nothing, not even a guilty verdict for Hunter Biden, can convince right-wing conspiracy theorists like House Speaker Mike Johnson that the Department of Justice is not under the direct control of the Democratic president.

CNN’s Manu Raju spoke to Johnson shortly after the ruling on Tuesday, and asked him whether he felt Biden’s guilty verdict undermined the GOP narrative that Democrats have implemented a “two-tiered” justice system to target Donald Trump.

“It doesn’t, every case is different, and clearly the evidence is overwhelming here,” Johnson said. “I don’t think that’s the case in the Trump trial, and all the charges that have been brought against him have been obviously brought for political purposes. Hunter Biden is a separate instance.”

Ever since Trump was found guilty of 34 felony counts in his hush-money trial, the former president’s allies in the far-right GOP have claimed louder than ever that the Department of Justice is a politically motivated weapon of the Biden administration. One might think this notion would be challenged by Hunter Biden’s guilty verdict, but that person would also have to imagine that these Republicans operate on a baseline of logic or reason. No such luck.

The Republican response to Biden’s conviction is unsurprising, since the cast of disgruntled lawmakers hasn’t been convinced by any other evidence that challenges their worldview. Last month, the Department of Justice released an indictment against Texas Representative Henry Cuellar and his wife, charging them with bribery and money laundering. On Monday, a witness in the case against Bob Menendez testified that the New Jersey senator agreed to intervene in two criminal investigations, in exchange for a Mercedes. Both Democrats. Both pursued by the Justice Department.

The reality that Johnson would have the public ignore is that the evidence was overwhelming in Trump’s case too. That’s precisely how a unanimous jury found him guilty of all charges.

In terms of Biden’s case not being “politically motivated,” it’s worth noting that the case brought against him is considered relatively rare among gun prosecutions, with even Fox News commentator Trey Gowdy suggesting he might be subject to political persecution. None of this can penetrate the victim complex of the Republican front-runner, however, or his cronies like Johnson.

As conservatives sort out their preferred conspiratorial reactions to Hunter Biden’s felony conviction on Tuesday, Marjorie Taylor Greene has helpfully come along to merge two competing conspiracies together.

Conservatives initially reacted to Hunter Biden’s guilty verdict by largely choosing one of two conspiracies: that Biden’s conviction is an offering from the Department of Justice to weaken outrage over Trump’s conviction, or that Biden’s gun conviction is simply smoke and mirrors to distract from the (very false) allegation that Joe Biden took a bribe to coerce the Ukrainian government away from investigating a gas company whose board Hunter Biden sat on.

Marjorie Taylor Greene has opted to blend these two together, posting well after the initial surge of hot takes that Hunter Biden is “the Deep State’s sacrificial lamb.”

It will likely never occur to those circulating these conspiracies that Trump’s conviction in the hush-money trial came from a city-level investigation unaffiliated with the Justice Department, which began more than a year before Biden announced his bid for president. Nor will it become apparent that Hunter Biden’s charges and conviction are relatively routine and that the Biden-Ukraine conspiracy to which conservatives clutch so tightly was found to have been totally made up by a former FBI informant with reported ties to Russian intelligence.

Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene has pushed Republican leadership to their wits’ end.

After she remained loyal to Representative Kevin McCarthy during his nine-month tenure as speaker of the House, her disruptive, attention-seeking actions and outbursts under Speaker Mike Johnson have led to some of her Republican colleagues calling for her to face consequences, according to a new CNN report.

“This is supposed to be a collaborative body, at least within your own conference, and she doesn’t play nice in the sandbox,” Republican Representative Carlos Giménez told CNN.

“She is not part of any group,” another unnamed Republican lawmaker said. “She’s kind of an island unto herself.”

“(McCarthy) kept her in Bubble Wrap,” said yet another anonymous Republican lawmaker.

In the past two weeks, Greene has continued to push for a long-shot impeachment vote against President Joe Biden and has also called for Johnson to push for a government shutdown instead of funding the Department of Justice, both of which are opposed by much of the Republican caucus. Prior to that, Greene led a failed effort to oust Johnson over aid for Ukraine in its fight against a Russian invasion.

Greene derailed the House Oversight Committee in May, when she insulted Democratic Representative Jasmine Crockett’s appearance in a hearing about holding Attorney General Merrick Garland in contempt of Congress, which many Republicans were pushing for. When Democrats asked her to apologize, she adamantly refused.

“There’s no f**king way I’m doing that. I won’t apologize. And I’m not leaving,” Greene said to committee Chair James Comer, a fellow Republican, she told CNN. “I don’t care what happens in this committee room—I will not leave.”

Greene has already been kicked out of the far-right House Freedom Caucus for feuding with other members and is campaigning against its head, Representative Bob Good. She has a long-standing beef with fellow far-right Representative Lauren Boebert and recently called the Republican Party “feckless and useless,” saying its members “have their head up their ass.”

Still, House Republicans fear the Georgia representative, according to CNN.

“They are over her, but they still fear her, because she has an incredible audience and fundraising mechanism and could turn that against you,” one GOP lawmaker said.

Representative Nancy Mace appears to have been double-dipping in her Washington, D.C., housing scam.

The House Ethics Committee opened an investigation into the South Carolina Republican’s use of a congressional reimbursement program after former staffers accused Mace of “secretly fleecing taxpayers” to the tune of $12,000.

Mace had, on several occasions, requested reimbursements of more than $3,000 at a time to cover costs associated with her $1.6 million townhouse—nearly double what her team had calculated she was eligible for.

But all the while, that property was simultaneously being leased out as a short-term rental on VRBO, an online vacation rental marketplace, according to pictures obtained by the Daily Mail.

The listing describes the large redbrick home as having three bedrooms (one king, one queen, and one room with two twin beds) and being good for events with 10 to 24 guests, noting that it is “perfectly situated a block from the Capitol. Perfect for short events where proximity to the capitol is ideal.” Pictures of the entry depict the house with two flags hanging to the sides of the front door: an American flag and the flag of South Carolina. The ad also lists the property owner as “Ruth M.” Ruth is Mace’s middle name.

“Representative Mace has violated House Ethics Rules by repeatedly seeking reimbursement for lodging in excess of the actual monthly expense of maintaining her co-owned townhouse in  Washington, D.C., resulting in a misuse of taxpayer funds for purposes unrelated to her official duties,” read an ethics complaint filed against the congresswoman last week.

Mace’s requests plainly violated two key rules of a congressional reimbursement program, according to the complaint: Lawmakers cannot be repaid for interest or principal on their mortgage payments, and they cannot ask to be repaid for more than their actual expenses.

Mace has repeatedly blamed her staff for her inaccurate financial reports—but that’s just one jagged element of working for the South Carolinian, whom former employees have described as fostering a “toxic” work environment. By February, every member of Mace’s staff had turned over since November 1, 2023, including deputy chief of staff Richard Chalkey, legislative director Randal Meyer, communications director Will Hampson, a financial adviser, a staff assistant, two legislative assistants, and her military legislative assistant. In fact, her former chief of staff is running against her in the South Carolina Republican primary.

For Republicans who oppose putting restrictions on purchasing firearms, resisting the urge to  cheerlead Hunter Biden’s guilty verdict in his gun trial might present a real-head scratcher. Just look at Representative Thomas Massie.

“Hunter might deserve to be in jail for something, but purchasing a gun is not it,” Massie wrote on X. “There are millions of marijuana users who own guns in this country, and none of them should be in jail for purchasing or possessing a firearm against current laws.”

The Kentucky Republican’s position, as confusing as it may appear, should come as no surprise. Between 2012 and 2023, political action committees for gun rights gave $42,500 to Massie, according to the Lexington Herald Leader. 

In 2021, Massie posted an image of his family’s Christmas card photo, which showed each member of his family holding a firearm. In total, the seven guns were estimated to cost between $20,000 to $190,000, according to Forbes. 

“Merry Christmas,” Massie captioned the picture. “P.S. Santa, please bring ammo.” 

Massie’s mind-bending statement also drove in another Republican trope: an insistence that the Biden family is guilty, but of what crime, they’re not quite sure. 

Conservatives are reacting to Hunter Biden’s felony conviction on Tuesday in seemingly the only way they know how: claiming it’s part of an elaborate conspiracy by the Department of Justice to weaken their outrage over Trump’s own felony convictions.

The reactions from the MAGAsphere were practically instantaneous on Tuesday, led by former White House policy advisor Stephen Miller who declared that Biden’s conviction is part of a plot to avoid pursuing foreign agent charges that would lead back to Biden.

“The gun charges are a giant misdirection,” asserted Miller. “An easy op for DOJ to sell to a pliant media that is all too willing to be duped. Don’t be gaslit. This is all about protecting Joe Biden and only Joe Biden.”

Similar to Miller, End Wokeness, a far-right account with over a million followers that frequently disseminates racist and conspiratorial content, opted to seize Biden’s conviction by pivoting to Ukraine conspiracies, announcing “Hunter Biden is a red herring. The real person of interest in the Ukraine bribery/laundering is the Big Guy. We all know exactly who that is.” The Joe Biden-Ukraine conspiracy alleges that during his time as vice president, Biden took a bribe to pressure Ukraine away from investigating a gas company to protect his son who sat on the board, a conspiracy led by an FBI informant who was recently charged for fabricating the whole story.

“Hunter Biden operated as an unregistered foreign agent and profited millions. The gun case was nothing more than smoke and mirrors from the Biden DOJ,” Texas Representative Lance Gooden declared on X (formerly Twitter).

Other far-right influencers have opted to paint Biden’s conviction as a tactic by the Justice Department to help them swallow the bitter pill about their dear leader’s own conviction. “Hunter got a fair trial, unlike Trump,” wrote conservative activist Tom Fitton. Conservative influencer Tim Young claimed he “predicted the Hunter Biden verdict” and linked to an interview he gave to a right-wing media outlet where he claimed the routine prosecution of Biden’s gun charge was a plot to create an “illusion of balance” following Trump’s guilty verdict. Young’s “prediction” does not include Biden being found guilty on all counts. Charlie Kirk, who leads the white nationalist-friendly Turning Point USA, accused the conviction of being a “fake trial to make the Justice system appear ‘balanced’” and advised his followers, “Don’t fall for it.”

Representative Matt Gaetz, in contrast, has had relatively little to say, writing off the conviction as “kinda dumb tbh.” That may be due to the fact that the last time he tried joining the hating Hunter Biden bandwagon, it blew up in his face.

The conservative reactions manage to be simultaneously totally unsurprising and completely unexpected: Conservatives have desperately sought to take down Hunter Biden, viewing his messy past as a lynchpin to bring about his father’s demise. That they’d adamantly avoid celebrating Biden’s conviction seems purely motivated by fear of reinforcing their already apparent hypocrisy.

Local television news broadcasters are airing suspiciously similar attacks on Joe Biden’s mental acuity and how it will affect the coming election—and it appears to be part of a coordinated effort.

The Sinclair Broadcast Group owns or operates 185 local television stations across the country, and dozens of their stations aired a segment from national correspondent Matthew Galka citing a Wall Street Journal article that makes dubious attacks on Biden’s age and mental awareness. The stations that aired the segment introduced it using startlingly similar, if not identical language, the Popular Information and Public Notice newsletters reported.

It’s not the first time Sinclair, owned by right-wing businessman David D. Smith, has appeared to be running a conservative propaganda campaign. Infamously in 2018, dozens of the company’s TV stations were caught airing an identical editorial about the dangers of biased and false news. This time around, the Rupert Murdoch-owned Wall Street Journal, as well as Murdoch’s cable news stations Fox News and Fox Business, have gotten in on the act.

Smith himself has long been a donor to Republican causes through his family foundation, which counts right-wing nonprofits Young Americans for Liberty, Project Veritas, Turning Point USA, and Moms for Liberty among its recipients. In 2016, the Donald Trump campaign cut a deal with Sinclair that exchanged extensive access to Trump in return for positive coverage without fact-checking. That same year, Smith met with Trump and reportedly told him, “We are here to deliver your message.”

Earlier this year, Smith purchased The Baltimore Sun, insulting its staff and laying out a vision to steer it in the conservative direction of his TV stations. It’s quite obvious that Smith, Murdoch, and other conservative millionaires and billionaires are taking over as many media outlets as possible to push right-wing political propaganda, with the Biden age article and subsequent TV segments as examples of the end product they want. They’re finding vast opportunities in America’s declining news deserts, as well as the skeletal newspapers gutted by hedge funds and profit-seeking corporations. It doesn’t just bode well for the next election, but also portends a scary future for American democracy for decades to come.

After publication, a Sinclair spokesperson reached out to The New Republic to clarify that “using a preproduced script for a package that has been provided by another media outlet is a common practice across the industry.”

This article has been updated.

Hunter Biden was found guilty Tuesday on three charges in his federal gun trial. He could face up to 25 years in prison for lying on a federal form about his drug use, lying to a gun dealer, and possessing a gun.

But as Republicans sprang into a frenzy, someone very unexpected downplayed  the first son’s conviction: Florida Representative Matt Gaetz.

“The Hunter Biden gun conviction is kinda dumb tbh,” Gaetz wrote on X moments after the ruling was released.

Gaetz wasn’t the only Republican rushing to retroactively claim that the gun possession conviction was pointless. Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk also chimed into the conversation, revealing a deeper reason why conservatives might not want to jump on the bandwagon against Biden’s son—all in a thinly veiled effort to aid another convicted felon, Donald Trump.

“Hunter Biden guilty. Yawn,” Kirk wrote. “The true crimes of the Biden Crime Family remain untouched. This is a fake trial trying to make the Justice system appear ‘balanced.’ Don’t fall for it.”

President Joe Biden, meanwhile, has already indicated that he won’t be pardoning his son. In an interview with ABC News last week, Biden said that he would accept the outcome of his son’s trial and that a pardon wasn’t on the table. Conversely, Biden said that Donald Trump was trying to “undermine” the legal system by claiming that he had been unjustly targeted by the legal system.

Biden repeated his acceptance Tuesday, saying that above all else, he would keep supporting his son.

“I will accept the outcome of this case and will continue to respect the judicial process as Hunter considers an appeal,” he said in a statement. “Jill and I will always be there for Hunter and the rest of our family with our love and support. Nothing will ever change that.”

Hunter has become a favorite target of Republicans over the last couple of years. Besides the gun trial—which dredged up emotional testimony from the 54-year-old’s ex-wife and sister-in-law about his drug use—conservatives have dogged Hunter with alleged tax evasion charges in California and with a sham inquiry remarkably devoid of evidence at the Congressional level, claiming that the president had netted millions off of his son’s connection to Ukrainian oil company Burisma. 

But that effort completely blew up in their face when their star informant Alexander Smirnov was indicted by the Department of Justice for lying to the FBI. Smirnov then reportedly admitted to law enforcement that top Russian intelligence officials were involved in the smear campaign against the sitting president. And all of the other witnesses that Republicans called on in their year-long probe instead debunked every single accusation against the Biden family.

Democratic donors are test-running a series of party-style campaign events aimed at getting young voters to the polls—a nice idea, but some of their tactics seem downright dystopian.

Over the past few months, The Voter Project has been hosting parties in Pennsylvania, fine-tuning strategies under the banner Stand Up Strong ’24, according to The Washington Post.

“Turning people out to cultural events is not a hard thing to do. The key thing is to make it fun and keep out the doom and gloom,” Kevin Mack, the group’s lead strategist told the Post.

Stand Up Strong ’24 recently held an event in Philadelphia that had all the usual fixings of a community event, including beer, free giveaways, and music.

But there was one more thing: a raffle giving away one month’s rent to lucky attendees. A total of $8,000 was distributed, according to the Post.

Democrats are so desperate to reunite with young voters that they’ve resorted to paying them. Somehow, throwing money at the problem seems easier than making substantial policy changes.

Unfortunately for Biden, his glacial work to erase crippling student loans for millions of people hasn’t proven to be enough to keep young voters, especially not in the face of his disastrous Israel policy, which has actively backed the country’s catastrophic military campaign in Gaza.

For the Biden campaign, youth voter turnout may be the key to keeping the White House in November. In 2020, an astounding young voter turnout, higher than in any presidential election in nearly 50 years, lifted Biden to victory. Without their support, 2024 could look a lot like 2016—with even more dangerous results.

It’s undeniable that community events are essential tools in building public power and engaging young voters. Just look at the massive pro-Palestinian rallies across the country! If only Biden could think of some way to tap into that … oh well.

Fox News is attempting to downplay conservative Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas’s astronomical $4 million in lavish vacations and gifts by fixating on gifts received by liberal justices—specifically, Beyoncé tickets given to Ketanji Brown Jackson by the superstar herself, which is just an unequivocally cool fact.

Jackson’s Beyoncé tickets, which the Supreme Court justice reported totaled $3,700, have consumed a substantial amount of Fox’s attention. According to an analysis by Mediaite, Fox spent multiple segments discussing Jackson’s tickets in detail while saying next to nothing about the real scandal of Thomas’s mind-boggling disclosure report. Fix the Court tallied all Supreme Court justice disclosures over the last 20 years, finding they collectively received more than $6.5 million in gifts—with a extreme majority of that total attributed solely to Thomas.

When Fox News does mention Thomas’s amended financial disclosure forms (which only come after bombshell reports expose that he failed to disclose them), it’s paired with mention of Jackson’s tickets, seemingly in an attempt to conflate being swayed by conservative billionaire interests with being swayed by the melodious rhythm of Queen Bey’s splashy bops.

According to Mediaite, in the week since Fix the Court’s findings, Fox News mentioned Clarence Thomas’s amended financial disclosures three times, each time omitting the astronomical quantity of his gifts. Every time Fox News mentioned Thomas, it brought up Jackson’s Beyoncé tickets and noted the price.

“Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas is acknowledging previously unreported trips that were paid for by a conservative billionaire,” said Fox News anchor John Roberts, during a June 6 episode of America Reports. “Thomas has amended last year’s financial disclosure form to include the trips that were back in 2019. The vacations to Bali and California were not originally included in his 2019 disclosure form. By the way, last year, Ketanji Brown Jackson, the justice, got four tickets from Beyoncé for a concert worth $3,700.”

The analysis from Mediaite further notes that Fox News carried its lopsided framing to its website, publishing articles that vaguely report on Thomas’s amended disclosures while providing itemized detailing of gifts received by Jackson. Fox describes the cost of the Beyoncé tickets as “eye-popping” and includes mention of a floral arrangement gifted by Oprah Winfrey to celebrate Jackson becoming the first Black woman to serve on the Supreme Court. Fix the Court responded to Fox’s focus on Jackson’s meager gifts while underplaying Thomas’s extravagant boon, posting on X (formerly Twitter), “$4,000 in gifts is the same as $4 million in gifts, right?”

“Here, a decision was made at Fox News at least five times—three on-air television reports plus the two articles on the network’s website cited above—to leave out the seven-figure total of the gifts to Thomas, leave out the broader controversy about Thomas’ gifts from Crow, repeatedly mention the four-figure cost of the concert tickets given to Jackson, and emphasize the celebrity aspect of the story,” Mediaite’s Sarah Rumpf notes.

Supreme Court financial disclosures are intended to prevent conflicts of interest, an issue that has come up frequently with Thomas. Fox’s fixation on Jackson’s Beyoncé tickets moves away from the purpose of financial disclosures toward making a scandal of the fact that Beyoncé did an extremely cool thing, and that tickets to one of her legendary concerts apparently cost just $925 apiece.