‘It is a whole different environment': Republicans revisit key Biden investigations with new momentum

CNN

2 days ago

The House Judiciary Committee is expected to interview former Hunter Biden special counsel David Weiss behind closed doors on Friday, two sources familiar with the interview told CNN, as part of a broader Republican effort to revisit previous probes into the Biden family that stalled last Congress but are gaining new momentum now that Republicans control both chambers of Congress and the White House.
The scheduled interview, which could still be moved, would be the second time the Republican-led panel will interview Weiss about his work as Republicans continue to probe whether the investigation was hampered by political interference.
Weiss has still never testified publicly about his six-year criminal probe into the president's son, which included three convictions, but was ultimately short-circuited as a result of the former president's unconditional pardon of his son.
House Judiciary Republicans have long wanted to call Weiss, the Trump-appointed US attorney, back for questioning after his first closed-door interview in 2023. Committee Republicans were also able to finally secure interviews with two Department of Justice tax division prosecutors involved in the Hunter Biden probe who they had been aggressively pursuing for months, one of the sources familiar told CNN.
The Justice Department is working with Weiss to provide access to documents he may need for his interview, a person briefed on the matter said. Any delays in getting access to documents would be a scheduling issue and the ability to have personnel who can oversee it, the person briefed on the matter said.
It's not the only Biden investigation Republicans are reexamining that leans into a fresh political appetite with GOP control of Washington.
House Oversight Chair James Comer is returning to his probe of the former president's mental fitness in an entirely new landscape after a recent book by CNN's Jake Tapper and Axios' Alex Thompson put Joe Biden's physical and mental decline back in the spotlight.
Comer told CNN he is in the process of scheduling key interviews with Biden's White House physician, Dr. Kevin O'Connor, and other senior aides who had all rebuffed his efforts last Congress. Beyond the five initial interviews from Biden's orbit, the Republican Chairman told CNN he wants to look at the executive orders Biden signed in his last six months in office and use of the autopen.
In the weeks immediately after Biden's disastrous 2024 debate performance that unraveled his presidential campaign and upended the Democratic party, Comer requested to interview Biden's doctor and subpoenaed three senior Biden aides to discuss their roles in the Biden White House, which never materialized.
Now, Comer said in an interview with CNN, 'it is a whole different environment.'
At the time of his 2024 interview requests, Comer's impeachment inquiry into the Biden family's business dealings had fallen apart and the Biden administration felt no incentive to comply with the House Oversight Committee.
Probing Biden's decline now, Comer says, will be a lot easier than trying to convince his colleagues of an alleged Biden family foreign influence peddling scheme, which even Comer conceded was difficult to do, particularly in a minute or less on Fox News. Republicans failed to uncover evidence to support their core allegations against the president, and lacked the votes in their divided, narrow majority last Congress to impeach the president.
'The money laundering and the shell companies, the average American couldn't understand that. I mean, that was hard to understand,' Comer told CNN. 'You know, I did not do a good job explaining that.'
But with his investigation into Biden's mental and physical decline, Comer said, 'people see a president that clearly is in decline. They saw it in the debate.'
Democrats sought to dismantle the Republican-led 11 month impeachment inquiry into Biden last Congress at every turn.
Comer told CNN that although those Democrats aren't jumping at the opportunity to cooperate now, he does not see them as being obstructive either.
'I take that as a step in the right direction,' he told CNN.
Tapper and Thompson's book documents how Biden, his closest aides and his family forged ahead with the former president's doomed 2024 reelection bid despite signs of his physical and mental decline.
In a previous statement to CNN, a Biden spokesman criticized the book, saying that evidence shows that 'he was a very effective president.'
Former Democratic Rep. Dean Phillips, who launched a long-shot challenge to Biden and was outspoken about his concerns over the former president's age, told CNN he did not think there needed to be an investigation on Capitol Hill at this point into Biden's fitness as president.
'This case already went to trial, the jury of American voters convicted the party of the accused, and handed out the harshest political punishment possible-losing the single most consequential election in modern history,' Phillips told CNN.
Instead, Phillips called on Biden to authorize his physician to disclose his health file and condition under oath.
'Only if the former president refuses, or if questioning uncovers possible criminal activity, should an investigation be initiated,' Phillips added.
Biden was recently diagnosed with an 'aggressive form' of prostate cancer.