Posted on 04/08/2024 5:10:47 AM PDT by Yo-Yo
Below is my column in the New York Post on the recent rebuke of the Justice Department by a federal judge in a hearing on the refusal to comply with House subpoenas in the Biden corruption investigation. The Justice Department appears little concerned over the glaring disconnect in how it treats its own attorneys as opposed to other citizens — a pattern that we have discussed previously.
Here is the column:
“Are you kidding me?”
Those are four words that no lawyer wants to hear from a judge in a hearing. But that was not the least of it for Justice Department lawyers fighting House subpoenas into the Biden corruption scandal.
U.S. District Court Judge Ana Reyes slammed the DOJ for stonewalling Congress on the subpoenas while imprisoning figures like former Trump adviser Peter Navarro for doing the same thing.
The Biden Administration has blocked the testimony of prosecutors Mark Daly and Jack Morgan, who were involved in an inexplicable decision of the Justice Department to allow major felonies against Hunter Biden to lapse.
In prior hearings, IRS whistleblowers testified that they had an agreement on the table to extend the statute of limitations on the crimes, but Special Counsel David Weiss allowed the period to lapse without any explanation. Since the DOJ was in the midst of a plea negotiations, it made no sense that the DOJ would simply kill potential charges.
The handling of the Hunter Biden investigation has been widely criticized as affording special treatment to the President’s son, including scuttling searches of Biden property and giving Hunter a heads up before attempts to interview him.
Ultimately, the DOJ cut a plea bargain with Hunter that many of us rejected as laughable. It not only failed to charge the full array of still viable criminal allegations (including being an unregistered foreign agent), but included an absurd immunity agreement that would bar future charges.
The plea agreement fell apart in open court after the judge asked the lead prosecutor a simple question of whether in his long career he had ever seen such an immunity deal. He answered no.
Yet even after that meltdown, the DOJ admits that it tried to restore most of the agreement, but Hunter Biden’s team was insistent that the original deal remained enforceable — a position repeatedly rejected by later courts.
The DOJ was in a bizarre position. Its effort to give Hunter a sweetheart deal — or at least most of the original deal — could not occur because the beneficiary wanted it all. It had little choice but to charge him with the tax and gun crimes.
The House is in the midst of an impeachment inquiry that includes allegations of influence over the Hunter investigation. While insisting that there was no pressure or special dealing in the matter, the DOJ has blocked key sources of evidence.
That led to the House subpoenas.
I also have previously written on the sharp contrast between the Hunter Biden charges and those against Sen. Menendez despite the underlying similarities.
The only way for the House to investigate such corrupt special dealings is to interview the principle actors, including these two attorneys. Otherwise, as Democratic members have done, critics can insist that they have no direct evidence of wrongdoing.
It appears that confusion expressed by many of us is shared by Judge Reyes.
Judge Reyes noted the obvious: “There’s a person in jail right now because you all brought a criminal lawsuit against him because he did not appear for a House subpoena.” The DOJ demanded six months in prison. Navarro is now serving a four-month sentence.
Former Trump adviser Steve Bannon also received a four-month sentence.
Reyes noted that “I think it’s quite rich you guys pursue criminal investigations and put people in jail for not showing up . . . And now you guys are flouting those subpoenas. . . . And you don’t have to show up?”
Reyes noted that the DOJ lawyers were “making a bunch of arguments that you would never accept from any other litigant . . . I imagine that there are hundreds, if not thousands of defense attorneys . . . who would be happy to hear that DOJ’s position is, if you don’t agree with a subpoena, if you believe it’s unconstitutional or unlawful, you can unilaterally not show up.”
The Justice Department insisted that it is different when its own prosecutors refuse to testify and noted that the House had also refused to a demand to have other Justice Department lawyers present for the depositions. They then stressed that the decision to defy the subpoena came after lengthy deliberations “at a high level.”
Reyes then asked if the DOJ would drop its opposition if it were allowed to have DOJ lawyers in the room for the questioning. When the lawyers said that they could not answer that question at this time, Reyes exclaimed, “Are you kidding me?”
The answer is that they really are not kidding about any of this stuff. The Justice Department continues to act with utter impunity in these cases. It abandoned consistency years ago with any semblance of restraint.
Jonathan Turley is an American attorney, legal scholar, writer, commentator, and legal analyst in broadcast and print journalism. A professor at George Washington University Law School, he has testified in United States congressional proceedings about constitutional and statutory issues. He has also testified in multiple impeachment hearings and removal trials in Congress, including the impeachment of President Bill Clinton and both the first and second impeachments of President Donald Trump. Turley is a First Amendment advocate and writes frequently on free speech restrictions in the private and public sectors. He is the author of The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in the Age of Rage (Simon & Schuster 2024).
The weaponized Deep State DOJ is nothing but a bunch of far-left weasels playing Gestapo to the American people.
If there's two standards - one for 'the elites' and one for the 'common people' then justice doesn't exist and the law is nothing more than a sledgehammer for the powerful.
There's a reason why they call it the "Just Us" department. They live by their own rules, and they're the ones charged with enforcing the laws on themselves.
Can someone here who knows how to contact Rep MTG directly with a message, please tell(ask) her to repeatedly hammer Garland next time he is in front of her -”Stop using the phrase [with your weaselly voice/ht:S.Bannon] “No fear or favor” on how you prosecute or don’t prosecute!! You are a LIAR! You FEAR the MSM! you FEAR Biden’s handlers!! You show FAVOR to Biden’s son and all around him. YOU ARE A LIAR!! So STOP the STUPID JOKE use of the phrase ‘No Fear or Favor’”
Pretty easy to fix this. Just demand the documents by 0800 tomorrow and have the top 10 in the org chart show up. They don’t comply, all 10 imprisoned pending charges in some hell hole prison. Repeat until compliance or no one left.
Department of Just Us……
Two items Biden finds at ‘Ice Cream Shoppes
<><>Ice cream cones
<><>and 6 year old girls to look at...
I guess that’s the only way he gets a sexual thrill......
Too bad the aging Jill doesnt do it for him anymore.....snx.
The wheels of justice turn slowly.
These Dems just throw sand in them.................
Jonathan Turley is one of a dying breed: an honest Democrat.
If there’s two standards - one for ‘the elites’ and one for the ‘common people’ then justice doesn’t exist and the law is nothing more than a sledgehammer for the powerful.
———-
Very, VERY well said!
“Repeat until compliance or no one left.”
While I wholeheartedly agree, they seem to have minion-judges at every level that work vigorously to keep bad state actors from facing any consequences.
Typically just one or two notches up the totem pole is all the further they need go.
WTF? So what? Do they mean that high level executive officials get to decide what the law is like a feudal system? Or are they saying, "Don't blame us, higher-ups made the decision."
There is a common pattern you can see here, in the prosecution of Trump in the classified docs case, the abuse of discretion by the ATF in its rule making, etc., etc.
Basically, executive branch officials -are- the law and do what they want, and everyone else - including the elected government- must answer to them.
There's a problem. Who will arrest those who are not complying? Who will prosecute those who are not complying? The agencies charges with this responsibility, the FBI and AG, have not and will not arrest or try anyone they (and the democrats) don't want arrested/tried. The proverbial fox is guarding the hen-house.
We want NAMES!
Give them Navarro’s very same sentence, in his cell block.
Thanks 115
Quit screwing around and send the House Sgt At Arms out to arrest these people. The Courts won’t touch that.
L
Unfortunately that would take the DOJ filing criminal charges against one of its own, which they will never do. A judge can't just arbitrarily find someone guilty of a crime. The most they can do is to hold them in contempt.
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