US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy is putting the idea of Joe Biden’s impeachment under investigation

In response to intense GOP pressure to show support for Donald Trump ahead of the 2024 presidential race, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy says Republican legislators may consider opening an impeachment investigation on President Joe Biden over unverified allegations of financial impropriety.

McCarthy said in comments made on Tuesday at the Capitol that the issues raised by House Republicans about the finances of the Biden family need more investigation. He admitted that the House’s investigations up to this point had not shown any misconduct, but he said that an impeachment investigation “allows Congress to get the information to be able to know the truth.”

The first step in filing articles of impeachment would be for the House to conduct an impeachment investigation. Such an investigation might go as long or as short as the House chooses, perhaps continuing into election year. He initially brought up the notion late Monday on Fox News, saying, “We will follow this to the end.”

McCarthy made his clearest statement to date on the possibility of Biden’s impeachment after the Republican leader blocked prior attempts by House conservatives to institute such an investigation.

McCarthy must address requests from Trump backers to prioritize their agendas while having a tiny majority in the House. At a Fox News town hall last week, Trump himself inquired as to why Biden hadn’t already been removed from office.

McCarthy has not yet given his support to any Republican contenders, including Trump, who is the party’s early front-runner for president. He refuted a rumor that said he was contemplating supporting House votes to throw out Trump’s two impeachments as an additional show of support.

On Tuesday, McCarthy said he hadn’t talked to Trump about opening an impeachment investigation on Biden and had no timetable for doing so. He was asked whether he would be endorsing anybody for president, but he refused.

When questioned about if Trump pressured him, he quipped, “Do I look like I’m under pressure?” The House GOP’s “eagerness to go after POTUS regardless of the truth is seemingly bottomless,” according to White House spokesperson Ian Sams, using slang for the President of the United States.

Sams said on Twitter, “This is what the House GOP wants to prioritize, instead of focusing on the real issues Americans want us to address like continuing to lower inflation or create jobs.”

Republicans in Congress have intensified their inquiries into Joe Biden and his son Hunter. The family’s finances are being investigated by House Republicans, specifically payments made to the younger Biden by Burisma, a Ukrainian energy firm that was involved in the initial attempt to impeach Trump.

Since then, Hunter Biden and the prosecution have struck to an arrangement for him to plead guilty to misdemeanor counts of years of tax evasion. In that instance, he is scheduled to appear in court this week.

Republicans, though, are still pursuing a Burisma-related hypothesis from the first Trump impeachment that has been mostly disproven. According to an anonymous confidential FBI informant, Burisma firm managers asked the Bidens for $5 million each in 2015 and 2016 in exchange for their assistance in overthrowing a Ukrainian prosecutor who was allegedly looking into the company.

Under Attorney General William Barr, a Trump appointee, the Justice Department began an investigation into the informant’s allegations in 2020. Eight months later, the investigation was declared to be unfounded due to inadequate evidence.

However, last week, Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, published the FBI’s FD-1023 form, which included unsubstantiated assertions from the informant and gave the public a complete view of the charges. James Comer, R-Ky., the chairman of the House oversight committee, and Grassley are collaborating on the request for the FBI document.

Democrats on the Oversight panel disputed the claims in a four-page report on Monday. They cite more records, including one from Lev Parnas, a former worker for Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani who denied the accusations and claimed to have direct knowledge of several of the talks. One of the Burisma officials allegedly assured Parnas that the allegations are untrue.

The Democrats also point out that Shokin’s failure to look into corruption in Ukraine was a problem for other Western partners in addition to Biden, who wanted to see Shokin dismissed as Ukrainian prosecutor. Biden has said time and time again that he never talks to his son about his business affairs abroad.

Karine Jean-Pierre, the press secretary for the White House, turned down questions about possible impeachment proceedings on Tuesday, reflecting the administration’s view that they would be a political distraction that wouldn’t have the backing of the general public or even McCarthy’s whole GOP majority.

McCarthy made a few quick remarks late on Monday on Fox that seemed deliberate rather than just joking about with the show’s presenter, Sean Hannity. He said that the activities of Biden are “rising to the level of impeachment inquiry.”

The speaker’s speech coincided with a meeting between Trump and Ohioans at his estate in Bedminster, New Jersey, including Rep. Jim Jordan, the Republican chairman of the Judiciary Committee who would likely oversee an impeachment investigation. Jordan’s spokesperson said that the visit was for unrelated Ohio-related issues.

McCarthy said on Tuesday that the committees’ inquiries will go on. Devon Archer, a former business associate of Hunter Biden who was convicted of securities fraud in a different case, is anticipated to appear before the Oversight Committee on Monday in a closed-door session.

Republicans have criticized the administration for its tardiness in responding to several committee questions. If the administration “denies us the ability to get the information we’re asking for, that would rise to an impeachment inquiry,” McCarthy said, “that would be grounds for an impeachment inquiry.”

McCarthy “has ensured that the House majority is little more than an arm” of Trump’s 2024 campaign, according to Jaime Harrison, chairperson of the Democratic National Committee, who made the claim in a statement on Tuesday. Harrison said that Donald Trump is in fact the House Speaker. “This is yet another Trump-supporting political ploy,”

McCarthy’s House GOP majority may be torn apart if Biden is impeached because moderate Republicans oppose the move. Republicans in the Senate also seemed leery of the notion.

“I’ll repeat what I’ve stated before: I believe that winning the election is the greatest way to change the president. The second-ranking Republican senator from South Dakota, John Thune, said that this entails looking forward rather than backward.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a longtime friend of McCarthy’s, who supports Trump, promptly offered her support. She said that Joe Biden must be removed from office as well as the two impeachments against Trump.

Democrats will fight Republican attempts to launch an impeachment investigation on Biden, according to House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries, because they are “not anchored in facts or reality.” It is based on radicalism.

During the course of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s attempt to dissuade Russia, Trump was accused of pressuring Ukraine to gather information on the Bidens. Trump’s first impeachment by the House lasted for many months in 2019. Later, the Senate cleared Trump of all charges.

After the assault on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, Trump’s second impeachment came quickly; a week later, the House indicted him with instigating an uprising. The Senate once again found him not guilty.