A Washington Post columnist on Tuesday mocked House Republicans investigating Hunter Biden after what had been promoted as” bombshell” testimony apparently fizzled.
Despite House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer’s (R-Ky.) claim that, “Every day this bribery scandal becomes more credible” during an appearance on Fox News on Monday, Philip Bump wrote for The Washington Post that he was wrong.
“In fact, it is no more credible now than it was in early May, when Comer and Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) first introduced it," he wrote.
"But (Fox's Sean) Hannity and Comer have a vested interest in presenting the allegation as credible and a vested interest in suggesting that closed-door testimony from one of Joe Biden’s son Hunter’s former business partners, Devon Archer, added to that credibility.”
Bump contended that Archer’s testimony did nothing to back up allegations that Hunter Biden influenced Joe Biden while he served as vice president.
Bump acknowledged that Hunter Biden had presented himself to Burisma, the Ukrainian gas company that’s at the center of the conspiracy that the GOP says implicates Joe Biden, as someone with access to the White House that could influence policy.
But Bump writes that, “The debate is over the extent to which that presentation was accurate. To date, there has been no evidence tying Joe Biden to Hunter Biden’s work in any concrete way, with the White House insisting that the president wasn’t involved in Hunter Biden’s business.”
Bump wrote that the bombshell that House Republicans promised in Archer’s testimony – that Hunter Biden would sometimes call his father in the presence of business partners to showcase his access – offers no compelling new information.
“This comports with the idea that Hunter Biden was selling this perception,” Bump wrote.
Bump wrote that Republicans have presented no evidence suggesting that the “illusion” of influence Hunter Biden claimed he had over his father was anything other than that.
“What’s understood from the Archer testimony is that Hunter Biden sought to use the “brand” associated with his last name as leverage in business deals. That alone explains nearly everything at hand, including his calling his father out of the blue to prove to potential partners that he had the power to do so,” Bump wrote.
“That there’s no evidence he ever tried to get Joe Biden to do anything reinforces Archer’s other reported claim: that Hunter promoted the “illusion” of influence over Joe Biden, not actual influence.”
