WASHINGTON — Former President Donald Trump’s argument about the “weaponization” of the justice system just collided with the president’s conviction by a Delaware jury Joe Biden‘s son Hunter.
The result, some Republicans say, is a major blow to one of Trump’s favorite talking points — and a boost to Biden’s argument that he respects the rule of law.
“Hunter BidenTrump’s conviction certainly weakens the argument,” said Dan Eberhart, a major Republican donor who supports Trump and believes he should focus on the economy rather than lawsuits. “For me, the justice system works.”
The younger Biden, 54, was found guilty Tuesday of three charges related to his illegal purchase of a gun while taking narcotics. The elder Biden was a strong supporter of the so-called Brady Bill, which made it a crime for addicts to buy guns, and it was a special prosecutor under his Justice Department who prosecuted his son.
Last month, Trump was convicted by a Manhattan jury on 34 counts related to falsifying corporate records to cover up hush money payments to a pornographic film actress to help his 2016 campaign. He is charged in federal court with keeping classified documents. And in separate cases in Georgia and at the federal level, he has been indicted on charges related to his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
He has routinely accused Biden — without evidence — of leading a multi-jurisdictional legal campaign to remove him from the political battlefield through criminal trials.
“This is all being done by Biden and his people,” Trump said in a statement the day after he was convicted in New York. “This is being done by Washington. No one has ever seen anything like it.”
His allies on Capitol Hill have called on Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg to testify before a House Judiciary subcommittee on government arming on July 12 — the day after Trump’s conviction.
But some Republicans say it will be difficult to convince voters that Biden has turned the justice system into a weapon now that his own son has been beaten.
“At the very least, it slows down the momentum and the clear argument that the Trump campaign previously made about Biden’s weaponization of the justice system,” said a Republican strategist who spoke on condition of anonymity to avoid incurring the wrath of Trump’s campaign would incur. .
“It’s less of a bumper sticker than before,” the strategist added, concluding that it will be difficult for Trump to plausibly argue that Biden put his finger on the scale to attack Trump but chose not to attack his own son to save. .
That dynamic seemed to create a confusing complication for Republicans, who splintered in their responses to the Hunter Biden verdict.
Kash Patel, a former Defense Department official and Trump national security adviser, said Hunter Biden’s trial was fair but Trump’s was unjust.
“Hunter Biden’s guilty verdict is a rare example of constitutional justice, one where individuals do not receive biased treatment based on their last name,” Patel said. “The jury was able to fully consider the evidence of the prosecution and defense, consistent with due process – a right that was single-handedly bastardized against President Trump by the judge, jury and prosecutors in New York. ”
Patel concluded that “these trials expose the inequalities in our justice system based on its weaponization, with political theater replacing the Constitution” and “Biden’s conviction demonstrates a fleeting moment of justice for all.”
But Trump campaign spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt called Tuesday’s outcome “nothing more than a distraction” from what she said are the “real crimes” committed by Biden and his family. Hunter Biden is still awaiting trial on federal tax charges.
Trump and his allies claim the president illegally profited from Hunter Biden’s foreign business dealings. Despite conducting extensive investigations into these claims, Republicans in the House of Representatives have still provided compelling evidence that they are true. One of the witnesses Republicans relied on to advance the investigation did so since indicted on charges of lying to the FBI about Joe and Hunter Biden.
Still, Stephen Miller, a top Trump White House official who still advises the former president, stuck to the script on Tuesday.
“DOJ is interfering in elections for Joe Biden – which is why DOJ has NOT charged Hunter with being an unregistered foreign agent (FARA) or with any crime related to foreign corruption. Why? Because all the evidence would lead back to JOE. DOJ is Joe’s election protection racket,” he wrote on X.
But his next post suggested that the jury’s verdict would benefit the president — to Trump’s detriment — as he accused the Justice Department of conducting a counterintelligence operation against the public.
“The gun allegations are a massive deception,” Miller wrote. “An easy option for DOJ to sell to a lenient media that is all too willing to be duped. Don’t be put off. This is all about protecting Joe Biden and only Joe Biden.”
New York Rep. Elise Stefanik, a member of the House Republican leadership who is often mentioned as a possible Trump pick for the vice presidential slot on his ticket, portrayed the verdict as less of a distraction and more of a turning point .
“Today is the first step in bringing accountability to the Biden crime family,” Stefanik said. “As Republicans in the House of Representatives, we must and will continue to investigate the Biden crime family for its corrupt peddling schemes that generated more than $18 million in foreign payments to members of the Biden client family.”
Her position echoed that of Alex Pfeiffer, a spokesman for the Trump-aligned political action committee MAGA Inc., who said the legal prosecution of Hunter Biden would lead “back to one man: Joe ‘10% for the Big Guy’ Biden.” “
Other Republicans quickly took positions more in line with gun rights advocates in Trump’s base, some of whom have long seen the Brady Bill and the ban on drug users purchasing firearms as a violation of the Second Amendment.
Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., a top Trump ally in Congress, effectively yawned in a post on X.
“Hunter Biden’s gun conviction is pretty stupid,” he wrote.
Between Republicans who expressed doubts about the continued effectiveness of Trump’s weaponizing justice argument and those who downplayed the verdict or counterintuitively portrayed Hunter Biden’s conviction as a sign of Joe Biden’s alleged corruption, the consensus among Republicans is that the Delaware jury did Trump no real political favor by finding the son of his political rival guilty.
“I don’t think this matters much, but it undermines the argument for a two-tiered justice system,” said a Trump ally who argued the former president would be better off letting that line of attack wither. The more that argument exists and is pushed, the worse it is for Trump. It hews too close to ‘threats to democracy’ and drives that issue – the only issue where Biden has an edge.”
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
