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Rep. James Comer (R-KY) downplayed using a witness who pleaded guilty to lying about a fake bribery scheme involving President Joe Biden and his son Hunter.

While speaking to CNN on Wednesday, host Pamela Brown asked Comer about using Alexander Smirnov in his impeachment investigation. The former FBI informant recently admitted he falsely claimed the Bidens took millions in bribes from Ukraine energy company Burisma. Smirnov was expected to be sentenced in January.

Appearing on CNN just moments after it was reported that the House Ethics Committee took a secret vote and agreed to release what is expecting a damaging report on ex-Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) a former colleague fumed and claimed he would push for any and all reports the committee has to be released.

Speaking with host Jim Acosta, Rep. Tim Burchett (R-TN) was asked about the report and immediately labeled the bi-partisan committee a "clown show."

"Do you support that?" host Acosta pressed his guest.

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"No, I don't," the Tennessee Republican replied. "I think Matt's out of Congress, and I'm going to push for the Ethics Committee to release all the findings they have on every congressmen, because if it's good for one, it's good for all of them."

"And, you know, congressional ethics to me, is kind of like a military intelligence –– it really just doesn't exist, you know," he continued before accusing, "This thing was leaked out by the Democrat chairman. They they're talking about bringing charges against her (sic) and this is it's a clown show. It's Congress 101, they're releasing it right now right before the big budget thing."

Pressed further, he replied, "This is just an investigation, it's not a court of law. It's in the past. It's you get one side of this thing and if they want to release it, release all of them. I think if it's good for the goose, it's good for the gander."

"Why are they hiding all the others? Why are they protecting powerful members, former powerful that are still powerful on this Capitol Hill?" he added. "And let's be honest to every one of these folks on the Republican side was was appointed by the former speaker [Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA)], which Matt and I both deposed –– or disposed of."

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Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) insisted that it was time to "start cutting" funds for food stamps because poor people should "go back to work."

During a Wednesday interview on Real America's Voice, Tuberville complained that the so-called farm bill in a House resolution to continue funding the government included $10 billion for farmers but did not cut $1.5 billion from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), commonly known as food stamps.

Reacting to reports that several of Donald Trump's key cabinet nominees are facing more resistance than expected, a member of The New York Times editorial board claimed GOP lawmakers are seeing how far they can go opposing the president-elect.

As MSNBC was reporting on Wednesday morning, DNI nominee Tulsi Gabbard and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., in line to become secretary of Health and Human Services, are getting pushback over their views and may not survive a Senate vote.

According to the NYT's Mara Gay, that could be a problem for Trump and his allies who have been ramping up a pressure campaign to get all of the nominees across the finish line.

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With "Morning Joe" co-host Joe Scarborough pointing to comments made by Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) where he criticized RFK Jr's ties to an attorney who wants the polio vaccine mandate rolled back, telling reporters, “I’ve got a completely open mind, but that kind of nonsense is not, it’s not helpful,” and then adding, "He should fire his lawyer,” Gay explained there is a rising tide of nominee resistance.

"There is a lot going on here," she told the panel. "I think that, first of all, I do think these senators are trying to flex some power with Donald Trump, because they don't want to spend the next four years just being a rubberstamp."

She added, "I think they are kind of trying to test their limits to see how far they can go without enduring his wrath. RFK is a decent target, considering the fact that he was a former Democrat. It is much easier for them to raise questions about this."

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A public health expert scorned Sen. Tommy Tuberville's analysis of vaccine mandates as illogical and unscientific.

The Alabama Republican met with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is Donald Trump's nominee for health secretary, and came away saying that they agreed that children are required to get too many vaccines instead of just three, as both septuagenarians had gotten as children in the 1950s, and Dr. Paul Offit faulted his reasoning during an appearance on CNN.

According to longtime political analyst, John Heilemann, overreach by the incoming Donald Trump administration will open the door to Democrats gaining back voters they lost in the 2024 election.

During an appearance on MSNBC's "Morning Joe," Heilemann said the Democratic Party has an image problem that depressed turnout for Vice President Kamala Harris, but it is not an insurmountable problem.

"It started with weakness with white working-class voters and now with Latino working-class voters and increasingly with working-class Black men and that's not a position that allows for the Democratic party to be the majority party in America," he told the panel.

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"We still have a country where you know, 60 percent of the country is not college-educated and if you are not able to compete for working-class votes, you cannot be a majority party," he elaborated. "And I think a lot of Democrats, when they think about what has to happen now, figuring that out and also figuring out this thing that Rahm [Emmanuel] was talking about, which is the party has become the party for a lot of people of the establishment, of the institutions and of the rich to some extent."

"That the fact that it's become the party of college-educated voters also means more affluent voters," he added. "This Trump administration offers some opportunities to again, to the point that Rev. Al Sharpton made for Democrats to get their mojo back in the populous lane, in the reform lane. Try to make these arguments about what you are seeing, or about to see in the Trump administration going forward, in terms of almost a pay-for-play element where it looks like kind of a give-away to plutocrats; it's a thing that, it opens opportunities for Democrats on both fronts."

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A Democratic strategist called out a Donald Trump ally's defense of his call to prosecute Liz Cheney over her role in the Jan. 6 investigation.

The former president called for her prosecution in a Truth Social post that cited a report issued by Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-GA), who alleged that Cheney may have broken "numerous federal laws" through her contacts with former White House aides Cassidy Hutchinson and Alyssa Farah Griffin, and former Trump legal adviser May Mailman agreed that the ex-congresswoman should be investigated.

A discussion on MSNBC on Wednesday morning about Donald Trump's return to making wild claims and accusations while raging on his Truth Social account in the middle of the night led one contributor to warn the press not to give the president-elect what it is he craves, by which he meant attention.

During his appearance on "Morning Joe," longtime political commentator Mike Barnicle complained that there is a tendency in the media to "overreact to everything the president-elect does dating back to when he first ran for president in 2016."

After a discussion about Trump lashing out at ex-Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) at approximately 2:30 AM ET, Barnicle cautioned the co-hosts about over-inflating each move and utterance of Trump.

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"There's another element to it and I would submit that it's around the president-elect tweeting at 3:30 this morning whatever it was he tweeted, or texted or what's --."

"Truth Social'd," co-host Jonathan Lemire prompted him.

"Truth Social, sorry, correction. I don't want to be charged with anything," he joked referencing Trump's latest tact of suing media personalities.

"We overreact to him," he claimed. "We overreact to every excess, every lie, every bizarre statement he makes which is what he wants and what he's getting again."

"It's how he got elected in 2016. It's how he got re-elected the second time out in November," he pointed out. "We overreact to everything. I can tell you, just ordinary people, out there in the country when they hear this, when they hear what he said, when he hears what we say about it or other people say about it and millions of people write about it in the papers, you know what they do? They tape their eyelids open in order to stay awake –– they're so sick of it."

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Donald Trump threatened criminal prosecution against Liz Cheney for alleged wrongdoing in the congressional investigation into his role in the Jan. 6 insurrection, and CNN analysts tried to parse his rationale.

The president-elect cited findings by Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-GA), who issued a report Monday alleging that Cheney may have broken "numerous federal laws," including witness tampering, and journalist Michael Warren believes the former congresswoman has little to fear, even if Trump installs MAGA loyalist Kash Patel as his FBI director.

Reacting to Donald Trump falling back on his old habit of going on Truth Social in the middle of the night to threaten and rant, the entire panel on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" claimed he is doing nothing but making his job with a slim-margin GOP majority Congress even more difficult.

At approximately 2:20 AM ET on Wednesday, the president-elect was on his social media platform taunting ex-Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY), which led co-host Joe Scarborough to state he is only making her more powerful and putting Republican lawmakers in a bad place.

"I will say even inside the people close to Donald Trump, they have been saying for weeks now, no retribution. He's not going to do retribution, we don't have time for retribution," he began. "This sort of talk early on, it's bad for everybody. It's bad for the House Republicans and it's bad for Donald Trump."

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"You put Liz Cheney out there, or you even talk about it, and you put out these stupid reports that this House subcommittee has put out, you are making her a martyr, you are making her bigger, you are making her more powerful. You are making her everything," he added.

Co-host Jonathan Lemire chimed in with, "In one of Trump's Truth Social posts he claimed he had the largest mandate in 129 years –– that's obviously not true at all."

Amazon faces a growing threat of a major walkout in the United States, with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters announcing Tuesday that workers at four of the online retail giant's Southern California facilities have "overwhelmingly" voted to authorize strikes, joining employees at sites in Illinois and New York City.

The announcement for DFX4, DAX5, KSBD, and DAX8 in California came after authorizations at the Amazon delivery station DIL7 in Skokie, Illinois on Monday as well as the Staten Island warehouse JFK8 and the DBK4 delivery station in Queens on Friday. Workers at all seven sites want Amazon to recognize their union and negotiate wages, benefits, and working conditions.

As Robert F. Kennedy Jr. makes the rounds on Capitol Hill, talking this week with Republican senators about his contentious nomination to be Secretary of Health and Human Services, and as the media continues to unearth even more highly controversial statements the anti-vaccine advocate has made, almost 20 GOP lawmakers have begun to voice their support for the Trump nominee, while Democrats, widely expected to vote against confirmation, by comparison have been less vocal and less definitive.

The Washington Post is tracking the positions of all senators on RFK Jr.'s confirmation.

A Republican senator launched into an anti-vaccine rant Tuesday when reporters asked about confirming noted health conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to be President-elect Donald Trump's secretary of Health and Human Services.

Kennedy was forced to backtrack this week following reports that one of his key aides tried to get the polio vaccine certification revoked in the United States.