Will Democrat wrongdoers ever face justice?
by Robert Knight · The Washington TimesOPINION:
Have you noticed that nobody on the left ever—ever— seems to pay a penalty for criminality and even treason?
“What will it take?” you might ask.
Exhibit A: When Joe Biden was vice president, he boasted on Jan. 23, 2018, before a Council on Foreign Relations audience that he had told the president of Ukraine in March 2016 to fire a prosecutor — or lose $1 billion in U.S. loan guarantees.
Viktor Shokin, the prosecutor general, was investigating Burisma, the energy company that had given Mr. Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, a plum job on its board. The elder Biden recounted his discussion with then-Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko and an aide:
“I said, ‘You’re not getting the billion.’ … I looked at them and said, ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money. … Well, son of a bitch. He got fired.”
The room erupted in laughter. I viewed the video several times. It’s real. You can access the audio on YouTube.
Nothing ever happened to Mr. Biden, whose family was also getting rich from deals with communist China. As a matter of fact, he became president three years later, with a stunningly implausible 81 million votes.
Fast forward to July 25, 2019. President Trump had a phone conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who was seeking more U.S. aid. At the end of the call, Mr. Trump asked Mr. Zelenskyy to look into well-founded allegations involving the Bidens.
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Democrats sprang into action. On Sept. 24, 2019, the House started a formal impeachment inquiry. Three months later, they voted to impeach Mr. Trump for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress, although the Senate declined to convict.
Democrats impeached Mr. Trump again after the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot, staged a kangaroo court trial and again failed to secure a Senate conviction.
I bring all this up because we have a huge institutional memory hole thanks to a legacy media controlled by leftists. Even after eye-opening exposures, Democrats skip away and conduct business as usual, their misdeeds forgotten.
President Barack Obama’s attorney general, Eric Holder, lied under oath about the U.S. shipping guns to Mexican drug cartels in 2012 and was held in contempt of Congress. Big deal. He stayed on as the nation’s top lawman for three more years.
In July 2016, under Mr. Obama, the FBI launched Crossfire Hurricane, which kicked off the Russia collusion hoax. Corrupt officials said the Trump campaign was getting help from Russia (which it wasn’t), and that a dossier full of disinformation was proof of Mr. Trump’s corruption. All of it was false, but that didn’t matter.
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The scandal tied up the first Trump administration and wasn’t resolved until 2023 with the Durham report’s release. FBI officials who misled a FISA court faced no charges.
After the Jan. 6 riot, several former Trump aides were hauled into court, including Steve Bannon and Peter Navarro. The two men rightly refused to testify against their boss and thus destroy Oval Office confidentiality. They were sent to prison for several months.
The list of Democrats, by contrast, who were caught red-handed with no consequences is as long as your arm. Then-Rep. Adam Schiff, California Democrat, who was ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, lied about having evidence of the Russia collusion and pushed the fake dossier. He is now a U.S. senator.
Mr. Obama’s IRS targeted conservative and tea party organizations from 2010 to 2012, trying to ruin them. Nonprofit division head Lois Lerner took the Fifth and left with a government pension.
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Secretary of State Hillary Clinton broke security rules, lied about her server and destroyed evidence. U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice flatly lied about what happened at Benghazi, Libya, in 2012, when four Americans were slain.
Biden health officials lied about the efficacy of alternative treatments to COVID-19 and ruined people’s lives with vaccination and masking mandates.
Mr. Biden’s attorney general, Merrick Garland, targeted pro-lifers and traditionalist Catholics while ignoring attacks on churches and crisis pregnancy centers.
And then there was the FBI raid in 2022 on Mr. Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence, four unfounded criminal prosecutions and several attempts to remove him from state ballots. Democrats say that holding anyone accountable for these abuses is “weaponizing government.”
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After all this, take heart that the tide finally may be turning toward justice.
Former FBI Director James Comey, who leaked confidential conversations with the president to the New York Times, has been indicted for his reposting an online meme apparently calling for the killing of the president.
The FBI under Director Kash Patel has brought 11 felony counts against the Southern Poverty Law Center, which has been stoking hatred against Christians and conservatives and making millions while funding real hate groups like the KKK.
The FBI is revisiting the Russia collusion hoax, including roles played by Obama intelligence adviser James Clapper, who lied to Congress about the NSA surveilling Americans, and former CIA chief John Brennan, who helped concoct a letter by 51 national security experts that lied about Hunter Biden’s laptop just before the 2020 election.
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The agency is also reportedly looking into COVID-19 czar Anthony Fauci’s conduct before and during the pandemic.
On May 15, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced a settlement with Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston to stop gender transitions on minors, pay $10 million to the state, fire the doctors and open a detransition clinic to help kids recover their natural sexuality.
The only thing better would be criminal charges.
There’s much more, but let’s pray that the wheels of justice might finally be rolling.
I told a friend about all this. Unimpressed, he said, “I spell ‘accountability’ this way: p-r-i-s-o-n.”
• Robert Knight is a columnist for The Washington Times. His website is roberthknight.com.
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