Pelosi Owns The J6 Commission, And That's Why It Failed
Category: News & Politics
Via: vic-eldred • 3 years ago • 87 commentsBy: Mollie Hemingway (The Federalist)
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's January 6 Commission was supposed to help Democrats hold onto their slim majority during tough 2022 midterm elections. Instead, it stumbled out of the gate, failed to gain legitimacy among the public, and has been plagued with serious legal and ethical problems.
Pelosi's decision to politically exploit the riot at the Capitol was a no-brainer. Democrats nearly lost the chamber in 2020 when Democrats took control of the Senate and presidency. The president's party almost always loses significant numbers of House seats during midterm elections. The only time that didn't happen in recent history was 2002, following the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Pelosi understandably felt her best bet to preserve power was, with a massive assist from left-wing media, to somehow turn disgruntled Donald Trump supporters' riot at the Capitol into the next 9/11.
There were massive problems with the scheme. For one thing, Republicans had immediately and vociferously denounced the riot. This was a far cry from the Summer of Violence, when Democrats and their media enablers cheered as leftist groups destroyed sectors of cities throughout the country, resulting in "some 15 times more injured police officers, 23 times as many arrests, and estimated damages in dollar terms up to 1,300 times more costly than those of the Capitol riot."
Democrats did not condemn these serious and lengthy attacks on the White House, federal courthouses, police buildings, private businesses, and homes. Instead, they joined with the rioters in calling for the defunding of police and other radical measures.
The riots were the result of a deeply destructive lie, pushed by top Democrats, that the country and its policing are irredeemably evil and racist. What's more, any and all attempts to quell the siege of federal buildings were condemned in the most hysterical terms by Pelosi and other Democrats.
Kamala Harris, then a senator from California and the Democrats' vice-presidential nominee, supported bailing out rioters who destroyed much of Minneapolis. Pelosi pooh-poohed the destruction of federal statues and historical markers. Republicans had consistently opposed political violence, beginning in the summer of 2020, but Democrats had not.
Still, the plan might have worked had Pelosi put together a decent committee. Yet she made several critical errors if she hoped it would be taken seriously.
Consider, first, how Republican House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy managed a similarly important committee with a confidence that Pelosi has lacked.
Democrats threw together their first impeachment of President Trump in 2019 after their long-promised Russia collusion impeachment fell apart due to lack of evidence. Democrats and their media enablers had been claiming for years that Trump was an illegitimate president, and some Republicans had helped them in their general efforts to oust him. McCarthy had a difficult task, knowing that Republican voters weren't nearly so weak as some of their leaders and would desert the party if it helped Democrats impeach President Trump.
McCarthy was constrained by Democrats' avoidance of the Judiciary Committee as the venue for the impeachment investigation. Pelosi was concerned that Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-New York, didn't have what it would take to run impeachment. Impeachment was instead run through the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, then led by Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif.
That committee included a few Republican members known for opposing Trump, such as Rep. Will Hurd, R-Texas. He and Mike Conaway, also of Texas, had already announced they weren't running again. Some were urging McCarthy to remove Hurd and replace him with someone else. But McCarthy let everyone who wanted stay, while also encouraging any members who enjoyed performing oversight of the intelligence community but didn't want to take part in an impeachment circus to step away temporarily. When Rep. Rick Crawford, R-Arizona, graciously agreed to such a move, McCarthy replaced him with Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio.
Even that choice showed McCarthy's confidence, since both McCarthy and Jordan had run for the top leadership spot not long prior. Jordan had also successfully helped block McCarthy from becoming speaker a few years prior. But once McCarthy was made Republican leader, he made Jordan the top Republican on the House's Oversight and Reform Committee, even over the objections of his supporters on the Steering Committee.
The diverse Republican group on the Intelligence Committee ran an effective opposition, even with Schiff and Pelosi manipulating the proceedings for maximum gain. In the end, Republicans held together, with not a single member of the conference voting to impeach Trump over his phone call with the Ukraine president. It was significant that conservatives and moderates all agreed the charges didn't pass muster. In the Senate, only Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah fell for the impeachment trial as led by Schiff, leading to Trump's first acquittal.
By contrast, Pelosi's roster management has been something of a disaster.
Chairman Bennie Thompson of Mississippi is not even pretending to aim for impartiality and is not well versed in due process. He filed a lawsuit against Trump months before Pelosi chose him as her chairman. And he recently told rabid MSNBC conspiracy theorist Rachel Maddow that if you invoke your constitutional rights against being forced to testify, you are "part and parcel guilty" of crimes.
Pelosi picked Schiff for the committee despite — or perhaps because of — his years of fabulism and lies concerning the Russia collusion hoax. Schiff falsely claimed for years that he had secret evidence that Trump had colluded with Russia to steal the 2016 election, leaked fake Donald Trump, Jr. emails, fabricated the transcript of a 2019 phone call between former President Donald Trump and Ukraine's president, and lied about his interactions with the so-called whistleblower behind House Democrats' first impeachment of Trump.
Far from protecting members from the politicized committee, Pelosi also harmed a few vulnerable members by putting them on it. Rep. Stephanie Murphy, D-Florida, was viewed as a "rising star" in the party, even being floated in May as a tough potential opponent for Republican Sen. Marco Rubio. But a few weeks ago, she announced she would not even try to win re-election for her House seat.
Rep. Elaine Luria of Virginia is also facing a tough re-election race, in a district the Republican governor-elect just won. Her seat is being targeted by Republicans. Being part of a uniparty probe with ethical problems can not be helping.
Pelosi's fatal error, however, was blowing up her own committee by taking what she herself admitted was the "unprecedented" step of removing the Republican ranking member and another top member from it. Pelosi said that she would not allow Rep. Jim Banks, R-Indiana, a distinguished Afghanistan veteran and leader of the Republican Study Committee, from serving. She also banned Jordan, now ranking member of the Judiciary Committee.
Pelosi later claimed the members' concerns with the integrity of the 2020 election were the reason. But that made no sense, since she appointed Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Maryland, and he objected to Trump's election in 2017. Pelosi herself objected to President George W. Bush's election in 2004 and said there was "no question" that the 2016 election was "hijacked."
The resolution establishing the committee requires the committee to follow House rules on the ranking member and minority party representation. But since Pelosi removed the ranking member, its subpoena and deposition activities are at best questionable, and at worst illicit.
Worse, the committee has been falsely claiming to witnesses to have ranking representation. Pelosi's hand-selected "co-chair" is Liz Cheney of Wyoming, who is expected to lose her re-election bid in a few months. The Republican Party of Wyoming does not recognize her as a member, and she lost her Republican leadership position last year because of her vindictive obsession with fighting Trump, whose less interventionist foreign policy she regularly opposed during his time in office.
Known for being a primary pusher of the false "Russian bounties" claim, Cheney has falsely been presented as the ranking member of the committee. She is not. She was chosen even before the Republican-appointed members were removed by Pelosi.
After Pelosi removed the choices of the Republican conference, she added another hand-selected "Republican" to represent her Democratic conference. Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Illinois, also announced he would decline to run for re-election, rather than face defeat from his voters. No Republican-appointed member serves on the committee.
Pelosi wanted to run the commission as a star chamber, and that's precisely how it's being run. It's being used to persecute political opponents, violate due process, and obtain the private communications of Republican members, citizens, and journalists. It has been exposed for repeatedlyfabricating evidence. And Pelosi herself has blocked the release of evidence implicating her office in mishandling security at the Capitol.
Pelosi is expected to step down from Congress following her lame-duck term and expected loss of the majority in November. Her handling of her J6 Committee shows she has lost her leadership skills and lacks the confidence necessary to run such a political operation.
Mollie Ziegler Hemingway is a senior editor at The Federalist. She is Senior Journalism Fellow at Hillsdale College. A Fox News contributor, she is a regular member of the Fox News All-Stars panel on "Special Report with Bret Baier." Her work has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, the Los Angeles Times, the Guardian, the Washington Post, CNN, National Review, GetReligion, Ricochet, Christianity Today, Federal Times, Radio & Records, and many other publications. Mollie was a 2004 recipient of a Robert Novak Journalism Fellowship at The Fund for American Studies and a 2014 Lincoln Fellow of the Claremont Institute. She is the co-author of Justice on Trial: The Kavanaugh Confirmation and the Future of the Supreme Court . She is the author of " Rigged: How the Media, Big Tech, and the Democrats Seized Our Elections. "
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Reading this I realized how great a difference there is between Pelosi and McCarthy. It will be good to see here gone.
That's one of the good things about 2022.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi should have taken leadership lessons from House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy.
How does anyone get beyond that sentence? What a way to start an article!
You can't comprehend that? Or is exercising power all that matters?
Yesterday we heard from somebody who told us that Republicans have to be better than that, no matter what democrats have done. They should take a look at your comment.
You haven't got the word yet?
Queen Bitch and her hand picked commission of fools and tools.
She knows her days are numbered. Wonder what she will do when she loses power after mid terms; and everything she is trying to hide is brought out into the open.
As for her two hand picked non Republican, TDS driven, idiots. Neither is technically even a Republican any longer. I sure Pelosi plans on pushing hard for the Commission to wrap up it's "investigation" before midterms. As after the commission will be ended; and the remaining members sanctioned, and stripped of their committee assignments. Another thing that Democrats can thank Pelosi for; lowering the standards for removing political opponents from their assigned committees. McCarthy already stated retribution would be coming. Well past time for Democrats to pay the piper.
They never got that far.
One can start by having open and unbiased eyes but I understand that is hard for some folks. Since the hive frowns on its worker drone thinking for themselves.
How does one remain unbiased about Kevin McCarthy’s leadership abilities? This is the guy who openly blamed Trump for the Jan. 6 insurrection and pressed for the swift transfer of power to duly elected Joe Biden, only to later cower like a little bitch and fall in line with the rest of the Republiqanon zombies. Wow, leadership!
And yet you accept Pelosi’s BS and eat it up with a spoon. A very biased spoon .....
Ah...ah...ah... we need to pass the bill, ah...ah...to see what's in it. She's a real rocket scientist.
The January 6th Committee is just getting started...
Once public hearings begin Trump will be exposed.
Like he was after the Meuller "investigation"? We all know that was a colossal failure by the Democrats. This won't be any different.
It's been a year now. As the investigation has stretched on for the past year, the Department of Justice has yet to answer whether or not federal agents were involved in it.
Why not?
Yep, that comment is like having deja vu all over again.
Be prepared to be disappointed yet again, as your heroine screwed up royally yet again.
The vast majority of thinking people don't give a shit about about the so called "insurrection".
due mostly to unprecedented legal stalling by the "innocent" perpetrators. guess what questions the republican primary participants will be fielding during their campaigns? a unique case of "they can run, but they cannot hide". I look forward to the endless news cycle of public humiliation by trump endorsed candidates in 2022.
Lessons from Walking Eagle Jr. Kevin, now that is funny. I didn't realize that the article was satire.
Another that doesn't get it.
In your opinion, which doesn't mean much, but carry on, Vic.
That's tough isn't it?
That your opinion doesn't mean much, I guess that it must be hard on your ego.
Carry on Vic.
Nobody likes repetition. You can do better than that..
You sure can, give it a go, Vic.
It's always a pleasure to back you down.
The things we get ourselves into!
Since you acknowledge that fact, why then do you keep posting OPINION pieces by Hemingway that rinse and repeat the same bullshit?
LMAO, only in your dreams, Vic.
Good morning Dulay
What is the bullshit you now speak of?
And never will ..... chalk another one up to union mentality.
Lol ..... now that comment is hilarious.
Thx for the hearty belly laugh
Good morning my friend. They call it bullshit. All I see is the much publicized actions & statements of Nancy Pelosi.
I’ve seen it nearly my entire life. Meanwhile union management rapes their membership with outrageously high salaries/perks while wearing gold Mr T starter kits around their necks
And it seems that Union management endorses one candidate, while the rank & file supports the other.
nope
Actually too many of the rank and file don’t. Like mindless drones they simply vote for who the union tells them to vote for. Not thinking about it for one second.
Trust me, I’ve seen it and it’s really unbelievable but unfortunately very true ime.
We've already talked about some of it and it's been defuncted prior to this Vic.
The Select Committee was created by a House Resolution. It clearly authorizes the Speaker to appoint 13 members "5 of whom shall be appointed after consultation with the minority leader." Pelosi consulted with McCarthy and McCarthy chose 5 members, 2 of which were rejected, 3 of which were accepted. Instead of nominating 2 more members, McCarty CHOSE to withdraw ALL of his nominations.
In short, Pelosi fulfilled the mandate of the House Resolution, McCarthy's fee fee got hurt and he took his ball and went home.
Oh and BTFW, Hemingway's overt political bias oozes from her Op/Ed. She throws into her 'article' unfounded assumptions, allegations and innuendo that no real journalist would. But hey, that's why she's your go to right?
I've been in unions too, so I know how things changed over time, but you may be right, there are still those who vote as instructed.
I still recall the 1960 election. In those days unions were still tainted by mob support during their early histories. Both the UAW and the Teamsters had used Mafia thugs during the first strikes. Walter Reuther, leader of the UAW and a social activist, supported JFK. Jimmy Hoffa of the Teamsters supported Nixon.
Robert Kennedy, who was appointed DA by his brother only prosecuted one of them.
Wow! You must be old as Trump and...Biden!
Wow, that comment almost has as much unfounded allegations and bullshit as your seed.
Yep.
Spot on Vic, spot on.
So in the future Speaker McCarthy will only need to consult with democrats before rejecting everyone of them.
We won't hear any complaining later from you, right?
But, again you can't show us what's untrue.
Well debunk away.....................We'll wait.
That's a strawman fallacy Vic.
If you were to hear a complaint from me, it would at least be based on FACTS, rather than unfounded bullshit.
You should know the rules of the House:
The resolution establishing the committee requires the committee to follow House rules on the ranking member and minority party representation.
I already HAVE Vic.
BTFW, Hemingway offers NO references to support HER bullshit yet you and your thumbs up buddies accept it without question none the less.
Hemingway and her ilk count on uninformed and incurious sheep...
Here's one for ya:
That is FALSE. Period, full stop. Here, I'll hold your hand and give you the link to HR 503.
Text - H.Res.503 - 117th Congress (2021-2022): Establishing the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. | Congress.gov | Library of Congress
There is NO such requirement in the Resolution Vic. NONE, NADA. The House rules that DO apply are clearly cited. READ it and weep.
Thanks for proving my point for me Vic.
Those are rules that Hemingway wants you and yours to believe. She lied to you, but I don't blame her. That's how she makes money. It's on all of us to vet the information that we review BEFORE we disseminate it to others. It's a shortcoming in just about every seed you post.
Been there, done that Jim. Try to keep up.
As Norm Macdonald use to say "Good Lord" is anybody able to support their bullshit in your eyes?
There is NO such requirement in the Resolution Vic. NONE, NADA. The House rules that DO apply are clearly cited. READ it and weep.
There is no requirement that House members treat each other with dignity either. You do realize that Pelosi has crossed another boundary and I don't want to hear any complaints from you should McCarthy staff his committees with nothing but partisans come next year.
Hemingway doesn't even try and neither have you.
At your invitation I have cited multiple falsehoods in Hemingway's Op/Ed. You bailed.
Actually, there is.
BTW, you've devolved to utter deflection. Hemingway lied and your enabled that lie. Own it.
That is a wholly ridiculous comment Vic. Committee staffing is inherently 'partisan' since they are made by Party leadership.
You do realize that Hemingway lied to you, yet you chose to continue to use her as a source. That's on you.
Oh and BTFW, I could not care less what you do or don't want to hear. My participation here has NOTHING to do with your proclamations. Get over yourself.
That statement is a blatant lie. Other than Pelosi, what Speaker has appointed all the members on a committee?
That is a blatant strawman.
And to this day it's hilarious how many still believe
And this is where Pelosi's "Commission" loses the bi-partisan aspect she claims. In essence she hand-picked her team for this. Nothing more than partisan grandstanding that will fail just like the Meuller investigation.
They want to believe.
Except almost every word in your block quote is utter bullshit.
Feel free to debunk it then. I'll wait. I'm sure the author will as well.
OMG, you've uncovered a lot of "bullshit" already and it's only 9:30 in the morning!
Actually, I'm on Central time so it's only 9:10 right now. I'm up 7ish daily.
BTW, you're the one that posted this bullshit.
I really don't care where you live.
That's your response? You didn't debunk a goddamn thing. Reality of it is you backed up my statement in #5.
You fail to state why the drunk rejected those 2 appointees (not that I'm surprised). Reps. Jim Banks of Indiana and Jim Jordan of Ohio were rejected for, as Pelosi called it "respect for the integrity of the investigation." The only thing this partisan drunk is looking for was submission. She wanted appointees that would do what SHE wanted. Banks and Jordan, wouldn't play her partisan games. So she hand picked people who she wanted (i.e. Liz Cheney who has been disavowed by her own party and stands a very good chance of being voted out by her bosses).
This is nothing more than partisan grandstanding that will fail just like the Meuller investigation.
I sure as fuck did and nothing in your statement is founded.
I don't accept the predicate of your statement Jeremy.
Oh, and WHY Speaker Pelosi rejected Banks and Jordon is irrelevant, though well deserved.
We're talking about the veracity of the seed and Hemingway LIED.
The fact is, Jordan admitted to being a fact witness before the Resolution was voted on. Banks is a Big Lie believer.
So McCarthy picked Reps. Rodney Davis of Illinois, Kelly Armstrong of North Dakota and Troy Nehls of Texas so they would submit to Pelosi? Interesting posit Jeremy.
No Jeremy, they'd play their own as they have been for years, which would be laughable if they weren't so dangerous for the country.
I wonder if you realize that implies that somehow Pelosi has McCarthy under some kind of spell...
LMAO. Keep thinking that.
You haven't proven otherwise. I'm damn sure not going to take you opinion as fact.
Reading the article again, then your comments again, I don't see a single place where you proved Hemingway lied. Time to put up or shut op.
I don't 'think' that Jeremy, I know it.
I posted a link to the bill Jeremy. I doubt that you've bothered to READ it.
The text of the bill refutes the lies in Hemingway's Op/Ed. If you can't recognize that FACT, that's on you.
If that's true, I can't help you Jeremy. Perhaps if you turned your bias dial down a couple of notches, you'd be able to recognize facts.
Again, I linked the Resolution. I can't understand it for you...
Then you'll have no problem providing where you got this "knowledge".
Lol .... that comment is just more damning evidence to the contrary ....
WTF is the problem Jeremy.
I ALREADY posted a link to the Resolution. I can READ and I understand it's content. It refutes Hemingway's lies.
Now that's it. I can't help the willfully obtuse.
Ah, on the eve of Epiphany, something Mollie the Hack never seems to have, Ms. Hemingway embarks on a look over there tour casting nutty aspersions for the dutiful squirrels to chase.
Have a nice day Mollie.
And you as well.
O, such biting repartee ... drying paint offers up more of a challenge.
Well, I keep it simple.
I'm not a counterfeit intellectual.
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The ongoing bitterness towards Hemingway after she thoroughly embarrassed progressives over Russia and Kavanaugh is something to behold.
If only they'd paid attention to her, they wouldn't have spent years propagating false narratives. Or maybe pushing lies doesn't bother them. Who knows.
The ongoing swilling of Hemingway's unfounded allegations, as illustrated in this seed, is a sad thing to behold.
Sean, this seed proves yet again that Hemingway is a propagator of false narratives. The comments prove that the right swill that propaganda and accept her lies with glee.
Oh no ... it’s the first anniversary of the “insurrection.” Scary! Must be a lot of left wing-nuts peeing their pants today.