Is the Looming GOP's Impeachment Bid the Last Straw to Unseat Joe Biden in 2024?

The GOP-led panel's impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden will create obstacles to his re-election bid due to media coverage and mounting evidence, the Center Square, a US conservative website, argued on Friday.

The House Oversight Committee, led by Rep. James Comer (R-Ky), is pushing ahead with an impeachment inquiry against the sitting president, launched by former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in September.

This month, the GOP-led panel has filed a great deal of subpoenas to interview Biden family members, their business associates, White House staff and other individuals.

In particular, the subpoenas have been sent for first son Hunter Biden, the president's brother, James Biden, their business associate Bob Walker; Hunter’s business associates, Mervyn Yan and Eric Schwerin, his gallerist, George Bergès, as well as art patron, Elizabeth Naftali. The panel has also sent subpoenas to ex-White House Counsel Dana Remus over Biden’s handling and retention of classified documents.

Last week, the House Judiciary Committee, chaired by Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) subpoenaed Lesley Wolf, a prosecutor in the Delaware US Attorney’s Office, as part of a related probe into apparent political interference during the Department of Justice's (DoJ) investigation into the first son.

IRS whistleblowers testified that Wolf had hindered their efforts to investigate the Biden family. For instance, she allegedly directed investigators to wipe away a reference to Joe Biden from a search warrant; she is also said to block the IRS team from searching the 46th president's premises.

Earlier, Jordan told Politico that GOP lawmakers are planning to interview as many as 15 witnesses, including Joe Biden's son Hunter, by the end of 2023. As per the media outlet, House Republicans could vote whether to impeach the incumbent president as early as January.

How House GOP Lawmakers are Building the Case

Comer subpoenaed Hunter and James Biden as well as their associates to ask questions about tens of millions of dollars received by the Biden family from foreign nationals and then directed to shell companies to hide their origin and destination. At least $24 million had been taken in within this scheme during Joe's vice presidency.

The panel has come to the conclusion that the president's family members capitalized on his name i.e. were involved in "influence peddling." Republican investigators are also said to have evidence that Joe knew about his son's business dealings and helped him (as over half of US voters believe, according to recent polls). It's still unclear, however, whether Joe Biden himself cashed in on Hunter's financial bonanza.

Republican lawmakers are looking for this evidence referring, in particular, to the so-called "laptop from hell", a device belonging to Hunter Biden and containing some damning emails, one of which alleges that a "big guy" had to receive 10% from a lucrative endeavor. Some of Hunter's former business associates claim that the "big guy" mentioned in the letter was Joe Biden.

Meanwhile, Comer is digging into Biden's classified documents case, suggesting connections between the illegally stored secret documents and the countries involved in the Bidens' overseas business dealings. Thus, reports say some of the classified memos may have been related to Ukraine, a country where the younger Biden worked as a Burisma employee (despite having zero experience) and received a hefty salary.

Against this backdrop, the DOJ's alleged interference in Hunter's tax investigation is seen by the lawmakers as Team Biden's efforts to keep the apparent corruption scheme on hush-hush. Republicans are also questioning Hunter's art deals pushed by influential Democratic figures, who also reportedly paid off the first son's debts, as a sign of simmering corruption within Dem ranks.

Could the GOP Succeed in Impeaching Biden?

The GOP's impeachment initiative has so far been seen as a long shot. First of all, they do not have a smoking gun for impeachment yet.

When it comes to the potential January vote on the articles of impeachment against Joe Biden, there are rumors that the GOP may not secure the needed 218 votes to get it done, despite having a 222-212 majority in the lower chamber. Some moderate Republicans are said to be highly skeptical about the initiative.

In addition, even if House GOP lawmakers manage to impeach Joe Biden, the Democratic-controlled Senate will most likely acquit the president.

Prominent legal scholar Jonathan Turley earlier admitted that as of yet, the House Republican probe doesn't contain enough evidence to impeach Joe Biden. Nonetheless, he defended the impeachment inquiry, arguing that there are too many questions surrounding the sitting president and his family which demand answers.

"I believe it’s your duty to determine if the president is involved in what is a known form of corruption," Turley told House lawmakers back in September.

For its part, the Center Square believes that the impeachment probe may further complicate Biden's efforts to stay in the White House after the 2024 elections. Time will tell whether it will become the last straw amid Joe's plummeting approval numbers, an ongoing border crisis, troublesome US economic indicators, and foreign policy disasters.