(NewsNation) — The far-right has created a new villain from within its own ranks. Following the maligning of lifelong Republican and Trump-appointed FBI Director Christopher Wray, now lifelong Republican and Trump-appointed U.S. Attorney David Weiss has become the latest law and order boogeyman.
In the wake of Weiss asking for and receiving broader powers to prosecute Hunter Biden, which one would think would be supported by those who had long been calling for this, his appointment is now a “sham” and a “a joke.” That’s according to folks like House Majority Leader Steve Scalise and Oversight Chairman James Comer.
Sen. Ted Cruz called it a disgrace.
“This appointment is camouflage and it’s cover up. It’s disgraceful. Listen, David Weiss was the U.S. Attorney handpicked to lead this investigation, who spent the last five years covering it up,” Cruz said. “David Weiss is subject to two whistleblower complaints from senior career IRS officials (who) came forward (and) said (they’ve) never seen an investigation like this in their entire time in law enforcement.”
Now, I predicted this was coming after the testimony of the IRS whistleblowers. Because for them to be right about what happened in the Hunter Biden investigation, Weiss would have to be lying. And politically, it’s advantageous in this case for the far-right to believe that Weiss has decided to risk his reputation and career to protect the son of the Democratic president and to help cover up for the so-called “Biden crime family.”
Weiss is now dismissively referred to as part of the Biden Department of Justice even though he was specifically held over from the Trump administration and now granted the independence of special counsel status — as was John Durham, which I’ll talk about in a minute — so he can conduct his own investigation. Which, of course, seems is not good enough for those who don’t actually want a legal proceeding against Hunter. They want a political cudgel to try to use against President Joe Biden.
Let me be clear, I am not going to defend anything Hunter did. Joe Biden should have known better than to allow Hunter to use him the way he did. We have discussed all of that before and we will again. But today, this is about Weiss, who is, by the way, now also a villain to Hunter Biden’s lawyers, who are accusing him of improperly backing out of the plea deal and of caving to political pressure from the right.
“If the special counsel decides not to go by the deal, then it will mean that he or they decided something other than the facts and the law are coming into play,” Hunter Biden’s attorney said on CBS News.
Some on the left share that sentiment. The more radical political figures on the right began to sour on Weiss when some investigators leaked that they believed there was enough evidence to charge Hunter Biden in October, when The Washington Post reported that, “Federal agents investigating President Biden’s son Hunter have gathered what they believe is sufficient evidence to charge him with tax crimes and a false statement related to a gun purchase, according to people familiar with the case.”
After that article came out, there was a meeting the next day that Gary Shapley, a supervisory agent, and Joseph Ziegler, an IRS special agent since 2010, testified that they came to believe the Justice Department slow-walked and meddled in the investigations into Hunter.
According to Shapley, Weiss said in that October meeting last year that he would not be the “deciding official” regarding whether to prosecute Hunter Biden.
Despite Attorney General Merrick Garland’s assurances that Weiss had complete autonomy and Weiss confirming that many times, they testified that they had heard that Biden-appointed U.S. attorneys in California and Washington blocked Weiss from prosecuting Hunter on felony tax charges in those jurisdictions.
They say that Weiss said he was turned down when he sought special counsel status months ago after being told by the local prosecutors that they would not bring charges.
“It appeared to me, based on what I experienced, that the U.S. attorney in Delaware in our investigation was constantly hamstrung, limited and marginalized by DOJ officials, as well as other U.S. attorneys. I still think that a special counsel is necessary for this investigation,” Ziegler said.
Shapley said: “Based on my experience, I am here to tell you that the Delaware U.S. Attorney’s Office and the Department of Justice handling the Hunter Biden tax investigation was very different than any other case in my 14 years in the IRS.”
Ziegler and Shapley contended that the investigation into Hunter was stymied by political bias within the DOJ in favor of Biden. Shapley said prosecutors concealed contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop from investigators, delayed the execution of search warrants until after the 2020 election and didn’t allow investigators to follow up on disputed WhatsApp messages between Hunter and a Chinese businessman where he seemingly referenced his father.
Except, as has been repeatedly highlighted, Biden wasn’t even president when those original decisions were being made — Trump was — and Bill Barr was the attorney general.
But, Weiss became a political target when he contradicted the claims that he wanted to bring additional charges but was stopped by Biden-appointed prosecutors. He also repeatedly denied the various other claims, as when he wrote on June 30: “In my June 7 letter I stated, ‘I have been granted ultimate authority over this matter, including responsibility for deciding where, when and whether to file charges and for making decisions necessary to preserve the integrity of the prosecution.
“I have been assured that, if necessary, after the above process, I would be granted (special attorney status) in the District of Columbia, the central district of California, or any other district where charges could be brought in this matter.'”
That’s consistent with a follow up letter he later sent on July 10, writing that: “I have not requested special counsel designation. I was assured that I would be granted this authority if it proved necessary. And this assurance came months after before the October 7, 2022, meeting referenced throughout the whistleblowers’ allegations. In this case, I’ve followed the process outlined in my June 30 letter and have never been denied the authority to bring charges in any jurisdiction.”
He had ultimate authority, and he never requested special counsel status because he didn’t need it.
So, this lifelong Republican, who President Trump described as sharing “the president’s vision for ‘making America safe again’” in 2018, would have to be lying if any of those allegations from the whistleblowers were to be true.
Again, the whistleblowers may have believed that to be the case, but for it to be actually true, Weiss has to be lying and risking a nearly 40-year career to cover for Hunter Biden.
And now we have a whistleblower on the other side.
A 14-year FBI veteran, we learned last week, prepared a 22-page statement for staffers of the Senate Judiciary Committee accusing the FBI of suppressing efforts to investigate members of former President Trump’s inner circle, including Rudy Giuliani.
Bottom line, it seems that different investigators wanted to pursue different things, but they don’t get to make the final call.
Weiss even offered to testify in front of Congress and presented up to four possible dates for his testimony. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Republican Jim Jordan responded that they wanted “to talk to everyone else” first, saying they had around 11 or 12 different people they wanted to talk to.
Of course, in any rational world, those who had been calling for a special counsel would be celebrating that Weiss now has broader authority and that Garland granted it to him.
In fact, 93 House Republicans and 33 Senate Republicans signed letters last year calling for just this – Making Weiss special counsel. And, at the time, I thought they made a fair point.
But not now. The complaints range from Weiss offered a “sweetheart” deal to Hunter Biden, to “he can’t be trusted,” to “this is a cover-up to prevent Weiss from testifying to Congress,” to the technical legal argument that a special counsel should come from outside of the government. So, let’s address them.
Reasonable people can disagree about the appropriate punishment for Hunter Biden, but ask any nonpoliticized former or current federal prosecutor and they will tell you that failing to pay taxes, particularly where money is paid back, very often become civil issues, not criminal. Yes, the more egregious cases can become criminal. But regardless, this deal was well within the scope of the way these misdemeanors with these facts with a defendant with no criminal record would be handled.
As for the gun charge, I have not been able to find another case ever prosecuted for possession of a weapon by a drug user where it was one gun, the defendant had no criminal history, there was no crime committed, the gun was not used in a crime and there were no other aggravating favtors. That isn’t a defense of Hunter Biden. It’s a legal reality.
But now that the plea deal has fallen through, Weiss is again vigorously pursuing a case. It’s a case that for a lot of reasons I think he should be making and maybe this deal falling apart is for the best. But politicians hoping to use his criminal case as a tool isn’t legal analysis, its political gamesmanship.
When it comes to the plea deal falling apart, was that Weiss’ fault? Yes, in part. There was too much ambiguity as to what can happen in the future. Again, if it wasn’t Hunter Biden, this deal would likely have never been shot down. But the judge scrutinized this with a fine-tooth comb, as she should in this sort of case, and she made totally fair points. She did not indicate that Weiss was going too easy on Hunter Biden, but rather the judge was protecting him from thinking he was immune from any future prosecution when he wasn’t because Weiss would not agree to that.
As for those alleging a cover-up to prevent Weiss from testifying, it’s true that with the case not ending now, Weiss likely won’t be able to discuss details publicly. Still, Jim Jordan was in no rush to have Weiss testify when he offered to testify, but now it’s a cover-up? And would they rather get the supposed sweetheart plea deal back in place so Weiss can testify?
And to believe this is a cover-up, again, is to believe that lifelong Republican Weiss has decided to lie and engage in corruption to protect Hunter Biden.
Finally, there is a more technical legal argument that this appointment of Weiss as special counsel was somehow improper.
“The appointment of Weiss as special counsel is improper under the federal regulations because it’s supposed to be somebody … who actually is outside of the government,” former federal prosecutor Andrew Cherkasky said on Fox News.
Jason Smith, R-Mo., told Fox News: “This is an attempt to whitewash the Biden family corruption.”
Except, then why didn’t these same people complain when Attorney General Barr did the same thing in appointing John Durham special counsel when he was a sitting prosecutor?
In both cases, Barr and Garland relied on a variety of statutes that permit the attorney general to authorize a sitting prosecutor broader power. And of course, if Garland had hired someone else outside of the government, the same claims of a “whitewash” would have almost certainly have been made, and whoever was appointed would have been accused of being a partisan, as has happened with Jack Smith.
And when the administration kept John Durham on to finish his work as they did for Weiss, I don’t recall the attacks on Durham as being part of the “Biden DOJ.”
But, of course, even Durham ended up being a disappointment to the far-right because he didn’t give them a clear cut blueprint for a political attack. He had concerns. He had critiques of the FBI, as did many other investigations. But despite his questions, even he could not and did not point to politics being the cause of the opening of the Russia investigation. It’s why people like Matt Gaetz accused Durham of being part of the FBI “cover-up.”
Bottom line, politicized media figures or leaders have anointed Weiss as the latest villain out to harm his own party by risking everything to corrupt the legal process. It’s a sad testament to what has been happening to honest law enforcement officials in this country trying to do their jobs the best and most honest way they can. Even if we don’t agree with all of their decisions, they, along with Weiss, don’t deserve this.
The views expressed in this article are those of the author, and not of NewsNation.