“Hunter Biden’s lawyers are playing to supportive media with ‘vindictive prosecution’ insinuations,” AmmoLand reported last month.
“Mr. Biden seeks specific information from three former DOJ officials and the former President that goes to the heart of his defense that this is, possibly, a vindictive or selective prosecution arising from an unrelenting pressure campaign beginning in the last administration, in violation of Mr. Biden’s Fifth Amendment rights under the Constitution,” Biden lawyer Abbe Lowell wrote in a request to United States District Court District of Delaware Judge Maryellen Noreika.
No dice, Special Counsel Jack Weiss replied in its opposition to Biden’s motion to subpoena the officials (former Attorney General William Barr, Deputy Attorney General Richard Donoghue, and former Acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen) and President Donald Trump filed Monday. And the rationale behind that opposition does not reflect kindly on attorney Lowell’s judicial acumen in putting the matter before the court:
“It is worth noting from the outset that defendant misunderstands the difference between pretrial arguments to dismiss an indictment and trial defenses. It is black-letter law that claims of vindictive and selective prosecution are not trial defenses and may only be brought and litigated pretrial. They are not defenses and, therefore, are never argued to trial juries.”
Weiss further notes a significant matter of timing that puts the lie to the vindictiveness claim:
“[Biden’s] arguments ignore an inconvenient truth: No charges were brought against defendant during the prior administration when the subpoena recipients actually held office in the Executive Branch. Instead, every charge in this matter was or will be brought during the current administration—one in which defendant’s father, Joseph R. Biden, is the President of the United States and Merrick B. Garland is the Attorney General that was appointed by President Biden and who personally appointed the Special Counsel.”
That Weiss is so forceful about that is curious. He did, after all, per Rep. Mike Turner, allow the statute of limitations to expire on felony charges against Biden, ignoring waivers alerting him to expirations. That makes it fair to wonder if the Justice Department senses Democrat Party plans to deal with Joe Biden’s problematic electability, and not just from concerns about the president’s mental acuity. Bringing things to a boil, the House Oversight Committee has produced evidence of the president receiving recurring payments from Hunter’s law firm “shortly after a bank money laundering officer warned that the same account was receiving millions of dollars in Chinese government-linked funds without ‘any services rendered.’”
BREAKING: The House Oversight Committee has uncovered evidence that Joe Biden received a recurring payment of $1,380 from his son Hunter’s law firm beginning in 2018, shortly after a bank money laundering officer warned that the same account was receiving millions of dollars in… pic.twitter.com/lqtiZ8ge0T
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) December 4, 2023
“The House of Representatives will vote next week on formally authorizing its impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden,” Spectrum News/Associated Press reported Tuesday, citing Speaker Mike Johnson who said Republicans have “no choice” after being stonewalled for information by the White House. Still, with viable alternative candidates waiting in the wings, it’s fair to wonder if Republicans are sure they want Biden out of the way in the ’24, and if sending him packing now will play into Democrat hands and end up being a Pyrrhic victory if he’s replaced by someone more electable.
As for Hunter Biden and his legal team’s desperate Hail Mary” play, if the Big Guy is forced out in disgrace, the prodigal son will be appropriately viewed as embarrassing and toxic. When the media is going to talking heads like Gambino underboss Sammy “The Bull” Gravano for commentary, and when he offers “We’re like choirboys compared to these people,” and other people might receive “22 lifetime sentences for this kind of stuff,” that’s a pretty good indication that the tide is turning.
Longtime gun wonders may recall Gravano was the source of a widely repeated quote at one time about imposing so-called “safety devices” to keep guns from firing:
“Gun control? It’s the best thing you can do for crooks and gangsters,” Gravano said. “I want you to have nothing. If I’m a bad guy, I’m always gonna have a gun. Safety locks? You will pull the trigger with a lock on, and I’ll pull the trigger. We’ll see who wins.”
And, of course, guns are why this story is being posted on AmmoLand in the first place, and Weiss refers to Hunter Biden’s illegal purchase in refuting the “vindictive prosecution” claim:
“Lastly, defendant points to nothing about the circumstances of his case itself that would weigh against his prosecution. Defendant himself acknowledged committing criminal conduct relevant to this case when he authored a book admitting that he was addicted to crack cocaine in 2018, the year in which he illegally purchased a gun. As discussed in Armstrong and Wayte, factors like the strength of such a case and its general deterrent value are quintessentially permissible considerations for a prosecution to proceed … It is unremarkable therefore that a prosecutor would choose to pursue charges on such discretionary factors, and defendant faces a significant uphill battle to demonstrate any discriminatory effect or intent in such a case.”
As for resulting cases this correspondent is involved in and has been reporting on, they’re still dependent on the Special Counsel charges playing out and on additional filings. A new Freedom of Information Act request related to the gun investigation is on hold pending resolution of the government’s case, and there’s an ongoing complaint to determine how the Justice Department presumes to have the authority to essentially invent a new class of “prohibited person” not statutorily authorized.
The Special Counsel’s opposition to Biden’s motion follows:
Even Special Counsel Jack Weiss Rejects Hunter Biden’s ‘Vindictive Prosecution’ Ploy by AmmoLand Shooting Sports News on Scribd
About David Codrea:
David Codrea is the winner of multiple journalist awards for investigating/defending the RKBA and a long-time gun owner rights advocate who defiantly challenges the folly of citizen disarmament. He blogs at “The War on Guns: Notes from the Resistance,” is a regularly featured contributor to Firearms News, and posts on Twitter: @dcodrea and Facebook.
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