House Republicans know that their rapidly shrinking majority—and their lack of evidence—has put them in an impossible position.

Despite drumbeating for more than a year to impeach Joe Biden, House Republicans have quietly begun looking for an off-ramp in the face of an overwhelming lack of evidence against the president—and a rapidly shrinking majority in the chamber.

Republicans have accused Biden and his son Hunter of corruption and influence peddling, but their lengthy investigation has failed to turn up any proof of the president’s wrongdoing. In fact, the biggest criminal act revealed during the course of the probe was committed by the GOP’s own star witness, Alexander Smirnov. The Department of Justice has accused him of making up the allegations against the Biden family that jump-started the whole impeachment effort.

As the investigation crumbles, Republicans are starting to sour on it entirely. “I don’t think we have the will to impeach Joe Biden,” Texas Representative Troy Nehls told Fox News on Tuesday. “We just don’t.”

    • Ekybio@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      Republicans never had facts on anything, so they will not care about them now

      • whotookkarl@lemmy.world
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        They had plenty of facts according to them until recently, it’s just those facts were unsubstantiated lies fed to them by Russian intelligence according to the operative who confessed he was working for Russia when he lied about the info to the FBI that the GOP were crowing about on Fox entertainews as extremely credible.

        Still waiting for apologies and resignations from Fox, James Comer, etc.

        • Burn_The_Right@lemmy.world
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          Conservatives knew the “evidence” was fake. The public at large knew the evidence did not exist. Everyone knew this was all made up, yet conservatives thought they could push this through by sheer will. This was never about evidence for them. This was always dishonest.

          A conservative is incapable of honesty. Every word uttered by a conservative is either deception or manipulation. Every word. This has been true throughout history and will not change in our lifetimes.

          • CileTheSane
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            7 months ago

            They probably just assumed if they started an investigation they’d come across something real that they could nail Biden on. After all, that’s true for any Republican, and they believe Democrats are just as corrupt as they are.

            • ovalofsand@lemmy.world
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              To believe that it’s a universal truth that Republican are bad by default is just another way to become mystified by propaganda. I recommend not that thinking because it’s nice to have robust solutions for the real problems we face and we each see something different. Just don’t let your brain fall out…

              • CileTheSane
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                7 months ago

                Any Republican that voted in favour of impeachment is fucking corrupt, as they already knew there was no evidence to support it.

    • Tylerdurdon@lemmy.world
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      But if you tell yourself impeachments against “your guy” were completely political, that must be how it works right?

      It must be so hard to live in that reality.

      • Goku@lemmy.world
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        It’s easier to live without thinking and without reason than you expect.

        Even an idiot can do it. They just assume they’re never wrong and yada yada yada narcissist’s prayer, etc.

        It’s very easy for them to live in that reality when:

        • you have talking heads on Fox news and other media outlets shoving talking points down your throats.
        • social media platforms will push lies for pennies to millions of users instantly
        • political careers depend on bending the knee to the loudest, most extreme, fear mongering, wannabe dictator.

        What’s hard is to break free from that reality and find the truth after you’ve allowed yourselves to be brainwashed by the cult which is the current state of “American Conservatism.”

      • jkrtn@lemmy.ml
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        They don’t live in that reality. What you have to understand about conservatives is that they have an enlarged fear center in the brain and they value white supremacist hierarchy over any other thing, even truth.

        They know for a fact that their guy did actual crimes and they just don’t care. They understand that storing Top Secret documents next to the bathroom copier is worse than the unsecured email server they were screeching about in 2016.

        If you consider a perspective where white supremacist hierarchy is more important than truth or integrity, all their behavior magically starts making sense.

    • DrPop@lemmy.world
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      But he was in a position to abuse his power and all people do, therefore despite lack of evidence and history of these acts he’s guilty. It was worth investigating but they should have stopped when it became obvious there wasn’t any real corruption.

      • Nastybutler@lemmy.world
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        It was worth investigating

        No. No it wasn’t. There was never anything to investigate other than the rumors they themselves made up.

  • OhStopYellingAtMe@lemmy.world
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    They should be forced to carry their impeachment hearing to term; even if they don’t want to, even if they were fooled/forced into starting them, even if they know it’ll be dead on arrival.

        • Scubus@sh.itjust.works
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          Presumably because they already hinted at that joke, I just didn’t think it was obvious enough. Others clearly disagreed

          • OhStopYellingAtMe@lemmy.world
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            I thought my hints were pretty obvious, without being overt. I didn’t downvote you, but I did consider replying with the ol’ “that’s the joke” meme.

            • Scubus@sh.itjust.works
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              Meh, if it’s not a serious comment then down voted don’t really matter. If it was, it’d be more disappointing because that tends to stifle conversation.

        • Ben Hur Horse Race@lemm.ee
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          the poster already made the roe joke. forced to carry it to term. then this genius chimed in: insert roe joke as if that wasn’t just done here, and they didnt even bother to make a joke

          dahnvoted!!

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    7 months ago

    Now that their “star witness” has been outed as a paid liar, and that the money is coming from Trumpland? Yeah I’d start getting reaaaly quiet and hope everyone forgets the whole event too.

    An American company that paid the now indicted FBI informant Alexander Smirnov in 2020 is connected to a UK company owned by Trump business associates in Dubai.

    Smirnov is now accused of lying to the FBI about Hunter Biden and his father, President Joe Biden, alleging that they engaged in a bribery scheme served as a major justification of the House impeachment investigation into the Bidens.

    • Nobody@lemmy.world
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      Nonsense. They just need to find a star witness who is better at lying and scrub the paper trail a little better this time. Anything worth lying and cheating for is worth lying and cheating for again. It’s not like there are any consequences.

      /s obv

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    Nah, they can’t abort this process at this point, they need to see it to full term.

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    “I don’t think we have the will to impeach Joe Biden,” Texas Representative Troy Nehls told Fox News on Tuesday. “We just don’t.”

    Substitute the word evidence for will in the above statement, and you’ll have something much closer to the truth.

    • CileTheSane
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      Doesn’t matter. They beat the drums long enough for their followers to screech “What about Hunter Biden?!” Any time Democrats try to bring up impeachment for actual crimes. Mission successful.

      Now it doesn’t matter how it ends, as long as it ends quietly enough that faux news can not report on it.

      • PM_Your_Nudes_Please@lemmy.world
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        Now it doesn’t matter how it ends, as long as it ends quietly enough that faux news can not report on it.

        And this is exactly why they’re trying to hit the Abort button now. A total lack of impeachment headlines is easy for republicans to hide behind a circus. If it never goes to a vote, then conservatives can’t be raked across the coals for failing. But “impeachment vote fails” is much much harder to hide, and the double-jeopardy rule could potentially prevent them from trying again in the future, (though that part is untested, since it hasn’t actually happened before. Some argue that they could still try again because double jeopardy only applies to criminal trials.)

    • baldingpudenda@lemmy.world
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      These trumplicans are the worst. During the beghazi bs, they beat that drum for YEARS that it actually stuck in voters minds. Even though the only conclusion was that Republican budget cuts and refusing to give money to bolster security caused it. These morons couldn’t give anything close to half truths or true sounding lies when asked follow up questions. Just kept hitting those talking points.

      Ex. Greene asked about possible trump VP and a follow up question on conspiracy theories with MAGA. just went NO YOU and ran off.

  • Gumby@lemmy.world
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    Don’t worry, they’ll just find a way to blame Democrats for the entire shit show

    • Clent@lemmy.world
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      How dare Biden not inform them that he wasn’t corrupt!

      Every republican is a corrupt piece of shit by default so it’s really on Biden for failing to following their norms.

      • CileTheSane
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        Every republican is a corrupt piece of shit by default so it’s really on Biden for failing to following their norms.

        That’s probably why they started the whole thing. “Everyone is doing something they shouldn’t, so if we start an investigation it doesn’t matter if it’s fake as we’ll find something true to nail him on in the process.”

  • BigMacHole@lemm.ee
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    Republicans told me Biden is the CROOKEDEST President in HISTORY! And I FULLY SUPPORT them not Impeaching him anymore because that’s what Republicans TOLD ME to support!

    -Republicans who Think For Themselves.

  • stoly@lemmy.world
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    Trump, who backs the impeachment effort, could then instruct the Justice Department to take up the charges.

    I might be mistaken but I thought that Congress specifically made it so that the president CAN’T do this after the abuses of Nixon. Although the AG is a cabinet position, the DOJ is functionally separate from the president’s overview.

  • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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    Gosh, I thought they had all this Sooper Sekrit evidence or something!? Kinda like Orly Taitz had all that evidence on Obama?

    Whatever happened?

    In other news - at least Marge got the platform to share her personal spank bank with the world. I bet anything she has a special folder of Hunter Biden dong pics.

  • Baphomet_The_Blasphemer@lemmy.world
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    They absolutely have the will to impeach Biden. What they don’t have is criminal acts supported by evidence to impeach him for… just a small detail.

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    maybe they realize that the monster we have now is way better than the horrifying thing we’ll have to deal with if Kamala becomes president.

    She’s in favor of civil asset forfeiture, prison slave labor, she’s perfectly fine with all the crimes that the banks commit every day and she’s a bloodthirsty maniac in favor of every war going on right now.

    • Jesus@lemmy.world
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      President Harris is not even a possibility if the house votes to impeach Biden. The Dems have the senate majority, and the GOP would need a 2/3rds vote. Heck, they likely wouldn’t even get all of the GOP senators voting for it.

      The plan was never to actually kick the guy out of office. The plan was to have a media stunt.

      • PM_Your_Nudes_Please@lemmy.world
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        Their plan was to minimize the legitimacy of an impeachment. Because Trump was impeached twice. So if they can impeach Biden based on no substantial evidence, then Trump’s impeachments look much less serious. Their goal has always been to water down the idea of impeachments, so Trump’s impeachments can’t be used against him in the future.

      • EmperorHenry@discuss.tchncs.de
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        Wanna know something? For part of Obama’s time in office, he had a filibuster proof majority in the house and senate and the only thing he did with it was to give us a republican’s idea for healthcare.

        A system that forces everyone to buy for-profit healthcare and still allows those for-profit companies to deny care.

        The democrats care so much about “bipartisanship” and “reaching across the isle” that they caved in to pressure that didn’t even matter.

        Why would they do this? Because the democrats actually wanted to do what they ended up doing, and now they don’t even bother virtue signaling any left-wing views. They just come right out and advocate for authoritarianism now.

        • EatATaco@lemm.ee
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          For part of Obama’s time in office, he had a filibuster proof majority in the house and senate

          No he didn’t. This is just a blatant lie.

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          It was the self named “Blue Dog” democrats like Manchin that torpedoed the health care bill.

          They were more than happy to reach across the isle and bathe in the corpo dollars.

        • Jesus@lemmy.world
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          A few corrections.

          • The house is a simple majority vote
          • Dodd Frank was passed in addition to the ACA
          • They only had the votes for a few short bubbles of time here and there. They had less than half the year if you added all the time up, and chunk of that was recess or with Kennedy on his deathbed.
    • Grass@sh.itjust.works
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      Really? From all I’ve seen of her talking I thought she was mentally challenged in some way and it’s a miracle she even made it to adulthood.