Celebration
Sure, Democrats celebrated in November. They held the Senate, in fact, gaining a seat. What was supposed to be a Red Tsunami (Ted Cruz) or a Red Wave (Kevin McCarthy) in the House turned into a Red Dribble (Marty Dahlman) with Blue tints. In the end, Republicans flipped nine seats, ending with a narrow five vote margin for House control.
This led to the Republican debacle of the House leadership election, when McCarthy needed a full week and fifteen ballots to wrangle his entire Party to cast their majority vote for him. As the week went on, you could feel the power of the Speakership diminish, as McCarthy made deal after deal. Right before the last vote, Congressman Matt Gaetz of Florida, still under investigation by the FBI, wrested one more thing from McCarthy in full public view, and finally “awarded” his vote.
Democrats enjoyed the spectacle, the ugly words and bargaining. They maintained solid unity behind their candidate, Hakeem Jeffries of New York; heaping praise on his abilities and his record in fifteen different nomination speeches. Jeffries himself demonstrated class, congratulating McCarthy on finally earning the gavel, and oratorical prowess. He gave an alphabetical litany of what the Democratic Party is all about. From “American values over autocracy”, and “Benevolence over bigotry,” to “Zealous representation over a zero-sum confrontation”, he explained the Democratic view.
Paybacks
But after all the Democratic celebrations ended, the Republicans did have control of the House. McCarthy is now “paying the piper” for the deals he made in that fateful week. One of those with the creation of the House Special Sub-committee on the Weaponization of Government. What does that mean?
After the four tumultuous years of the Trump Administration, many Republicans are aggrieved. Even before Trump was elected and took office, there was an FBI counter-intelligence investigation into his dealings with Russia. Then, after Democrats gained control of the House in 2018, there were Judiciary Committee Hearings on the Mueller Report. When a whistleblower, Colonel Vindman, reported that Trump pressured Ukrainian President Zelenskyy for “dirt” on Joe or Hunter Biden, threatening to withhold military aid, the Democratic majority House voted to impeach Trump. There was a trial in the Senate, where Democrats failed to even get a simple majority of votes to remove the President, much less the two-thirds needed.
And of course, after the January 6th Insurrection, there was the second Trump impeachment. This time the Senate vote was 57 to convict, and 43 to acquit, still short of two-thirds, but a “bi-partisan” statement of the Senate nonetheless. That Trump could possibly have been “that bad” just isn’t a Republican option. He was “wronged”.
So in our partisan world, Republicans now have the “whip hand” of committee assignments. And the most prominent Republican “whipper”, Ohio’s former state champion wrestler now Congressman Jim Jordan, is leading the charge to get “payback”, as Chairman of the Weaponization of Government Sub-committee.
The “Weapons”
The overarching theme of the sub-committee is that “the institutions of government” were somehow weaponized to defeat Donald Trump’s Presidency. From the FBI to the Justice and Treasury Departments to even the National Security Agency, the Republicans proclaim Steve Bannon’s “Administrative De-Construction” theory. The idea is that the civil service bureaucracy is a treasonous “shadow government” co-opted by the Democratic Party to serve their needs. So the sub-committee is searching for those “bureaucrats” who “ratted out” Trump (Ukraine), or protected Hilary Clinton (e-mails), or Hunter Biden (hard drive) or even slowed the building of “The Wall” (border). Oh, and don’t forget the whole Covid thing.
The Republicans learned a lot from the three years and seven million dollars of the Benghazi hearings in the early twenty-teens. They were able to “bring Hilary Clinton down”; creating so much negative feeling about her that even Donald Trump could win the Presidency. And now, they intend to use that same tactic against Hunter, (whoops, I mean), Joe Biden. They are wading into the implausible Hunter Biden laptop story, complete with the blind computer technician with the tam o’shanter on.
Hearing One
But before they get there, they brought in witnesses to explain “bureaucratic treason”. Instead of one of the eighteen supposed “whistleblowing” former FBI agents, or even tam o’shanter guy himself, they brought in two US Senators: octogenerian Chuck Grassley of Iowa and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin. Grassley “testified” his own opinion that the FBI is biased, and Johnson covered a plethora of bureaucratic complaints from Clinton emails to Dr. Fauci. Then Jordan added Constitutional scholar and Professor Jonathan Turley to “teach” the committee government. Turkey also testified for the “Trump team” in the impeachment hearings.
We expect witnesses to either give facts or “expert” testimony. Grassley and Johnson offered their concerns, without any hard evidence to back their assertions. But they found a receptive audience in Chairman Jordan and the majority members of the committee. That includes House Republican Conference Chair Elise Stefanik, Benghazi Committee veteran Darrel Issa, and, “got-the-deal-done” Matt Gaetz.
Democrats countered with their ranking member, former Impeachment Manager Stacey Plaskett. In addition former Impeachment lead attorney now-Congressman Daniel Goldman, and former Democratic Committee Chairman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz are on the dais. Their job: to counter the Republican arguments and poke holes in witness testimony. And they were allowed to have one witness of their own. Congressman Jamie Raskin, himself a Constitutional scholar, countered Turley’s testimony. Raskin also brings his own experience as an Impeachment Manager and a lead member of the January 6th Committee. He knows “real” treason.
In the Big Top
If you’re looking for a Congressional “circus”, this is the place. It will be interesting to see if Jordan and his committee can repeat their “success” of the Benghazi hearings. A lot has changed since 2014, when Hillary Clinton testified for eleven straight hours. After four years of Trump, two impeachments, an Insurrection, and a lot more awareness of “our truth” versus “their truth”, I’m not sure Americans will be so easily persuaded. Perhaps our partisan lines are so solidified, that nothing can alter our final votes.
But the show will go on, with Jordan as the ring-master, and tam o’shanter guy on the high trapeze. We’ll have to wait and see. Maybe Goldman will be the lion who eats the trainer.
