It’s time to call it: The House GOP’s shambolic inquiry into the impeachment of President Joe Biden expired on Wednesday night at 9:01 p.m. That’s when Sean Hannity opened his Fox News show by promising “highlights” from the day’s “explosive” hearing with Hunter Biden’s former business partners — and then immediately pivoted to a monologue not about its revelations, but about the president’s poll numbers.
Hannity did more than perhaps any other single figure to will the impeachment probe into existence. Since 2018, he has led a Fox propaganda campaign aimed at using lies about the younger Biden’s foreign business interests to damage his father’s political standing. The resulting House Republican impeachment effort has both followed Fox’s lead and played out in large part on its airwaves. But it has utterly failed to produce evidence of wrongdoing by the president that would convince anyone other than the network’s most fervent fans.
If even Hannity can no longer feign enthusiasm about the impeachment effort, it is truly toast — and Fox itself deserves a big share of the blame for leading Republicans into this debacle.
The House Republican impeachment inquiry satisfied Fox stars’ long-standing demands for a Biden impeachment, which began before he was even elected. When House Republicans regained the majority in the 2022 midterms, their synergy with Fox quickly became apparent. Committee chairs promised to carry out investigations into the various conspiracy theories the network had promoted over the previous years, including “the Biden Crime Family.”
Both sides stood to benefit. House Republicans received a steady stream of easy bookings where they could win plaudits from Fox’s right-wing audience. Fox hosts received fodder for monologues about the Bidens’ purported corruption. But there was a major flaw in the plan: While the heated coverage from the right-wing media convinced the Republican base that impeachment was…
Read the full article here
