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House Republicans will assume a majority on Tuesday, ushering in an era of the Biden administration that will be marked by conflict and relatively little legislative progress compared to the past two years, when Democrats held the entire seat. Congress and the White House.
After a dramatic vote to choose the new speaker of the House of Representatives, Republican lawmakers who for months have threatened a slew of oversight and ethics investigations against the executive branch will have a chance to make good on their threats.
Republican Reps. James Comer and Jim Jordan, who are expected to chair the Oversight and Judiciary committees in the new Congress, held a press conference in November after winning the midterms to announce a comprehensive investigation into the laptop and the alien of President Joe Biden and his son Hunter. Business issues.
Additionally, House Republicans have signaled that an investigation into the origins of COVID-19 would be a top priority, as well as an investigation into the 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Separate investigative threats at the Department of Justice over the perceived “politicization” and the Department of Homeland Security over the border crisis have sparked a cross-partisan debate over the indictment of Attorney General Merrick Garland and Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.
Here are the five investigations House Republicans have put on the table for the 118th Congress:
Republican Reps. James Comer and Jim Jordan, who are expected to chair the Oversight and Judiciary committees in the new Congress, held a press conference in November after winning the midterms to announce a comprehensive investigation into President Joe Biden’s finances. and their son Hunter.
Hunter Biden’s business and laptop
“I want to be clear: This is an investigation of Joe Biden, and that is where we will focus the next Congress,” Rep. James Comer said during a Nov. 17 press conference announcing a sweeping investigation into Hunter’s finances. Biden.
Republicans have accused President Biden of knowingly profiting from his son’s business ventures, while claiming Hunter previously took advantage of his father’s influential stature as then-Vice President to promote his overseas deals.
The allegations were prompted by emails recovered in 2020 from the hard drive of a laptop likely belonging to Hunter Biden, which appear to show him offering meetings with his father to domestic and foreign partners, among other deal-making discussions.
Hunter Biden has reportedly recruited a new lawyer, who at different times represented Jared Kushner and Bill Clinton, to help protect him from the impending attack, according to nbc.
Republican lawmakers claim to have obtained credible testimony from whistleblowers to back up the allegations.
The president has repeatedly denied any knowledge of and involvement in his son’s business dealings.
Republicans have accused President Biden of knowingly profiting from his son’s business ventures, while claiming Hunter previously took advantage of his father’s influential stature as then-Vice President to promote his overseas deals.
The COVID-19 Pandemic and Dr. Fauci
Republican lawmakers have flagged multiple investigative points of interest related to the COVID-19 pandemic, including the origins of the virus and the US government’s handling of health policy during the height of the severity of the pandemic. pandemic.
A proposed rules package released Sunday night shows the next session of the Republican Party will prioritize an investigation into the cause of the coronavirus.
A Republican-led report released last month suggests the possibility that COVID was created in China as a bioweapon and then accidentally leaked into public contact has not been ruled out.
And on Nov. 27, then-Ranging Oversight Representative James Comer told NBC News’ Meet The Press that his committee will focus on COVID funding in the new Congress.
He stated that “there have been hundreds of billions, if not trillions of dollars wasted in the last three years, so it spans two administrations, in the name of COVID.”
Conservatives are also likely to call Dr. Anthony Fauci, who rose to national fame and became a polarizing figure during the pandemic, to testify, something he has signaled he will be open to.
Conservatives are also likely to call Dr. Anthony Fauci, who rose to national fame and became a polarizing figure during the pandemic, to testify, something he has signaled he will be open to.
Crisis on the southern border
Illegal immigration has long been a core issue for Republicans, and the first two years of President Biden’s term are no different, with record numbers of people found at the southern border under his administration’s watch.
Border communities and even cities like New York and Washington, DC have seen their infrastructures overloaded by the large number of undocumented people who, in most cases, are fleeing unstable situations in Central and South America.
It has even led some on the right in the Republican conference to call for the removal of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, though more moderate Republicans have stepped up such threats.
A late November letter from Republicans on the House Oversight Committee to Mayorkas said: “The current state of the southern border is dangerous, chaotic and inhumane as smugglers continue to profit from the Biden Administration’s self-inflicted crisis. “.
“Republicans on the 118th committee in Congress will continue to monitor the national security and humanitarian catastrophe created by the Biden Administration’s policies,” the lawmakers promised.
Department of Justice and the FBI
Accusations of politicizing the Justice Department and the FBI reached a frenzy level over the summer when federal agents raided Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago mansion.
The investigation, stemming from documents Trump improperly seized from the White House at the end of his presidential term, has been a lightning rod for Republican criticism in both moderate and far-right factions of the GOP.
They accused President Biden and Attorney General Merrick Garland of arming the Justice Department against a potential rival to Biden in 2024.
The FBI has faced additional Republican scrutiny over revelations that high-level officials met with social media companies ahead of the 2020 election to flag possible “misinformation” attempts by malicious foreign actors, who the Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg previously revealed as the reason for the censorship of his platform. from an October 2020 New York Post story on Hunter Biden’s laptop.
A report by Republicans in the House Judiciary Committee late last year accused the FBI of fostering “a rampant culture of irresponsibility, manipulation and abuse at the highest level.”
Migrants queue near the border fence after crossing the Rio Grande to request asylum in El Paso, Texas, on Monday.
The chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan of the Biden administration
Multiple hearings on the withdrawal of the US military from Afghanistan failed to meet the threshold of Republican responsibility for the chaotic operation.
Rep. Michael McCaul, who is expected to chair the House Foreign Affairs Committee, has already signaled that he will want the panel to dig deeper into the crisis.
Last month, McCaul demanded that parts of the administration, including the Treasury and State Departments, turn over documents related to the withdrawal.
The inquiry is expected to look at multiple facets of the withdrawal, including the ISIS-K suicide attack that killed 13 US service members and 170 Afghans.
It is also expected to look at the thousands of Afghan allies, including applicants for Special Immigrant Visas, who were largely left behind to fend for themselves under the Taliban regime.
‘Why did it go so wrong? Why did the Americans stay behind? Why did the Afghan partners we promised to protect, 100,000 of them, end up in the hands of the Taliban?’ McCaul said in an interview with the new republic.
Multiple hearings on the withdrawal of the US military from Afghanistan failed to meet the threshold of Republican responsibility for the chaotic operation.