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As Hunter Biden Stands Trial, a Republican Noise Machine Goes Silent
Republicans have gone after Hunter Biden for years, but his trial on gun charges undermines their views on gun rights and on a “weaponized” Justice Department.
Follow our live coverage of the verdict in Hunter Biden’s gun trial.
For nearly four years, Republicans have delved into the darkest corners of Hunter Biden’s life, seeking to tie his troubles to his father, President Biden. But as the younger Biden stands trial in Delaware on gun charges, the case’s glaring political contradictions have rendered the G.O.P. largely mute, from former President Donald J. Trump on down.
It stands to reason: The baseless claim that the Biden Justice Department is running a political persecution of Mr. Trump is somewhat undermined by the department’s prosecution of the president’s son. It is also hard to make much of allegations that Hunter Biden lied about his drug use to purchase a handgun when your party is sponsoring legislation to ease gun-purchasing restrictions for veterans struggling with mental illness, not to mention the case before the Supreme Court that could allow domestic abusers to buy firearms.
So beyond the professional provocateurs in Washington and the right-wing media, Republicans have decided to say as little as possible.
“I wouldn’t read too much into a lot of people not talking about it right now,” cautioned Representative Kelly Armstrong, Republican of North Dakota, and a leader of the House investigation of Hunter Biden. “There’s been a lot of other things that have come up in the last three days. We’ll see what it looks like by the end of the week.”
Among those “other things” that Mr. Armstrong was referring to were the 34 felony counts that the party’s presumptive presidential nominee was found guilty of last week.
And while the Manhattan jury that convicted Mr. Trump of approving fraudulent business records to cover up hush-money payments to a porn star was impaneled by a state court and the prosecutors in the case worked for the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin L. Bragg, Republicans have insisted — wrongly — that the Biden Justice Department coordinated the entire case, which makes the department’s prosecution of Hunter Biden politically inconvenient.
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