Morning Wire XX
[0] After Hunter Biden's sweetheart deal fell apart, special counsel David Weiss plans to indict the president's son by the end of the month.
[1] What details do we know about the special counsel's case in what drove the DOJ to the apparent reversal?
[2] I'm Georgia Howe with Daily Wire editor -in -chief John Bickley.
[3] It's Thursday, September 7th, and this is Morning Wire.
[4] The leader of the proud boys is sentenced to decades in prison over the events of January.
[5] 6th, despite not being at the Capitol on that day.
[6] While we respect the judge's sentence, we respectfully disagree.
[7] We will be filing an appeal in due course.
[8] How do Americans feel about the stiff sentence?
[9] And can Donald Trump be barred from the 2024 presidential election ballot?
[10] One group is betting on it, but do they actually have a case?
[11] They're trying to convince the public that the former president is not qualified to hold office.
[12] And also, I think they just want to use up his resources and have to have.
[13] having to fight these lawsuits.
[14] Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire.
[15] Stay tuned.
[16] We have the news you need to know.
[17] The Department of Justice plans to charge Hunter Biden with crimes related to a legal possession of a firearm by the end of the month.
[18] The news comes from the Office of Special Counsel David Weiss, who has Delaware U .S. attorney negotiated a plea deal with Hunter that fell apart in court in July.
[19] Daily Wire reporter Tim Pierce joins us now to talk about the latest on Hunter Biden.
[20] So, Tim, this is an extraordinary turn of events.
[21] Just a few weeks ago, Hunter was one judge signature away from avoiding jail time altogether.
[22] What do we know about this coming indictment?
[23] Hi, Georgia.
[24] Weiss filed an update to the court on Wednesday that revealed he plans to have a grand jury vote on an indictment against Hunter by the end of the month.
[25] The charges relate to a time in 2018 when Hunter allegedly lied on a federal form required for the purchase of a handgun while he was addicted to crack cocaine.
[26] Why said he plans to charge Hunter with two crimes, using a banned substance and lying on a federal firearm application.
[27] The gun charge carries a sentence of up to a decade in prison.
[28] Morning Wire spoke to Heritage Legal Scholar Hans Von Spakovsky.
[29] Here's his reaction to the news.
[30] It's about time.
[31] The prior deal that they had given him on this was inexcusable.
[32] He would have walked out of a courtroom on probation, on his tax felonies, and would have avoided entirely having any kind of federal gun charge brought against him when it is standard for the federal government of the Justice Department to prosecute individuals who lie on the application form to purchase a gun and go to prison for that.
[33] Okay, so Weiss was responsible for what was widely criticized as a sweetheart deal the first time around, but despite that, he was then put in charge of investigating Hunter?
[34] Right.
[35] Before he was named Special Counsel, Weiss negotiated a plea deal with Hunter to entirely avoid the gun charge.
[36] The deal fell apart in July after a judge questioned prosecutors and Hunter's defense team over the extent of legal immunity Hunter would receive in the deal.
[37] Prosecutors said it was narrow, but the defense said they understood the immunity to cover any aspect of Hunter's life that the DOJ had previously investigated.
[38] The judge refused to sign the deal until the two sides could agree, which they never did.
[39] Several attorneys who worked on the deal have since stepped away from Hunter's legal team in anticipation of being witnesses in a court fight over what happened.
[40] Hunter's attorneys are preparing a lawsuit over what they say was bad faith by the Department of Justice, and they say part of the plea deal should be enforced.
[41] But however far the immunity stretched, Hunter was set to avoid any jail time related to the gun charge under that deal.
[42] Now Hunter is facing a max 10 years in prison.
[43] Here's Von Spikovsky again.
[44] Finally, we might actually get some justice that is not divided between liberals and conservatives with a two -tiered justice system.
[45] Now, does this have any bearing on any of those Republican investigations into President Biden?
[46] Not much.
[47] These charges aren't related to any of the conduct that could tie the president to business deals his family struck overseas.
[48] Politically, this is embarrassing, but it doesn't put the president in any direct legal jeopardy or provide any ammunition to Republicans to mount an impeachment case against Biden.
[49] That said, as we've reported, Republicans are taking steps in the direction of a possible impeachment inquiry into alleged Biden family corruption.
[50] So they're sure to be more coming out on that in the days ahead.
[51] So increasingly high legal stakes going from no jail time to potentially 10 years.
[52] Tim, thanks for reporting.
[53] Thanks for having me. Coming up, the leader of the proud boys gets the most severe J6 sentence yet.
[54] Former Proud Boys chairman Enrique Tario was sentenced this week to more than two decades behind bars in connection to the breach of the U .S. Capitol on January 6th, 2021.
[55] The sentence marks the harshest to date in the DOJ's handling of January 6th.
[56] Here to discuss is Daily Wire Reporter Amanda Presta Giacomo.
[57] Hey, Amanda, tell us about this sentence and remind us of what Tario has been found guilty of.
[58] Hey, John.
[59] So Tario was found guilty of seditious conspiracy by a federal jury in Washington, D .C. back in May, and then sentenced on Tuesday by Judge Timothy Kelly, who's a Trump appointee, by the way, to 22 years behind bars.
[60] He was facing up to 33 years.
[61] Before sentencing, Tario told the judge he is, quote, not a political zealot and asked for mercy.
[62] As we've covered before, Tario was notably not in D .C. on the day of the Capitol breach.
[63] So he wasn't charged with any physical actions.
[64] The government instead cited mostly private and some public messages from Tario and others to build this seditious conspiracy case.
[65] Prosecutors described Tario, who's the son of Cuban immigrants, as intelligent, charming, creative, and articulate, and said he used those talents to, quote, inflame and radicalize an untold number of followers.
[66] That seditious conspiracy charge is significant.
[67] It was enacted as a lot after the Civil War to arrest Southerners who might try to keep fighting the U .S. government.
[68] It's extremely rare in its application and hard to prove.
[69] But it's been used by the DOJ about a dozen times now in connection to the capital breach and so far rather successfully.
[70] Right, and there's been a lot of controversy about that.
[71] Now, Tario was hit with the steepest sentence to date in the J6 cases.
[72] Tell us about the sentences of his co -defendants who are also proud boys.
[73] Right.
[74] The government has really thrown the book at a lot of these J -6 defendants, especially members of the proud boys.
[75] Before Tario sentencing, Ethan Nordin was tied for having the longest sentence at 18 years.
[76] Nordine was convicted of seditious conspiracy as well and sentenced by Judge Kelly.
[77] Joe Biggs was also convicted of that same charge and sentenced to.
[78] 17 years.
[79] And the same played out for Zachary Rel, who was hit with a 15 -year sentence.
[80] Prosecution argued and Judge Kelly agreed that all four of those men be hit with a terrorism sentencing enhancement.
[81] All these men, with the exception of Tario, who again wasn't there in D .C., they were hit with charges alleging destruction to government property.
[82] None were accused of assault.
[83] This was more about inspiration and leadership, so often things they said.
[84] Right, a lot of free speech implications because of that.
[85] And as many have noted, Trump sort of looms in the background of these cases, correct?
[86] Yeah, that's certainly correct.
[87] Some have speculated that these harsh charges relating to the proud boys are connected to the DOJ's pursuit of Donald Trump.
[88] Trump said on television in September of 2020, quotes, Proud Boys Stand Back and Stand By.
[89] That was breathlessly reported by those in legacy media.
[90] That clip was shown by prosecution in this Proud Boys trial, and you can bet it'll be a focus at Trump's coming J6 trial.
[91] Yeah, I'm sure it will be.
[92] Now, the severity of the charges has surprised a lot of people.
[93] Do we know how the American people feel about these sentences or more generally how J6 defendants have been treated?
[94] Well, polling by Rasmussen from about 10 months after January 6th showed that nearly half of all Americans thought J6's defendants were political prisoners.
[95] And pulling from this year by Kuinipiac showed that about half the country is ready to move on from J6, finding it less significant an event than it's being portrayed.
[96] Some GOP lawmakers, too, have weighed in on this, saying that defendants are being treated poorly and far more harshly than any BLM protester or rioter has been treated.
[97] Missouri Senator Josh Hawley, for example, has called out the DOJ for this disparity.
[98] One case highlighted was over a BLM protester convicted of arson to a pawn shop that resulted in the death of a 30 -year -old man. The DOJ, which cited Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., argued for a lighter sentence for this man. He was sentenced to 10 years, and that's less than half of Tario's sentence.
[99] Lawmakers have also raised objections about how long some of these defendants have been held in jail without bond, awaiting their trials, arguing that their due process rights have been violated.
[100] All told, more than 1 ,100 Americans have been charged in connection to the capital breach, and more than 300 people have already been sentenced to prison time.
[101] Yeah, a lot of Americans paying a steep price for the events of J6.
[102] Amanda, thanks for reporting.
[103] You're welcome.
[104] A lawsuit has been filed in Colorado by six voters in an effort to use a provision of the 14th Amendment of the Constitution to keep Donald Trump off the 2024 presidential ballot in the state.
[105] This legal theory has been floating around for the past few months among liberal and anti -Trump legal scholars, but now it's set to have its day in court.
[106] Here to discuss the case is Daily Wire contributor David Marcus.
[107] Hey, Dave, so before we get to the specifics in Colorado, can you just remind us what this legal theory is that some are hoping could keep Trump off the ballot.
[108] Morning.
[109] We've mentioned this previously on Morning Wire, but the crux of it is that the 14th Amendment states that a person cannot run for president if they have participated in an insurrection or rebellion against the United States government.
[110] The amendment was passed just a year after the end of the Civil War in 1866 and was clearly meant to bar former Confederates from the White House.
[111] Trump isn't even charged with insurrection or rebellion, so a lot of legal scholars have scoffed at this and argue that even if it somehow succeeds in state court, the U .S. Supreme Court will almost certainly reject it.
[112] Why are they so confident that this will be defeated?
[113] Do they see fundamental flaws in this theory?
[114] Absolutely.
[115] First of all, there's real question as to whether these six voters even have standing, which is to say the right to bring this suit.
[116] Second, while Trump was impeached for sedition by the Democrat control House of Representatives for the events of January 6th, he was found not guilty of those charges by the Senate.
[117] And finally, as scholar and legal expert Hans von Spakovsky explains, the provision may not even actually exist anymore.
[118] The biggest problem they have is that if you look at Section 3, it has a unique provision in it, which they just tend to ignore.
[119] The final sentence specifically says that Congress can remove Section 3 and the disqualification provision by a vote of two -thirds of each house.
[120] Congress did exactly that.
[121] In 1872 and 1998, they passed two amnesty acts that got rid basically of Section 3, so it doesn't even exist anymore.
[122] If the suit is successful, it would compel Colorado's Secretary of State Jenna Griswold to remove Trump from the election materials.
[123] Has she said anything about this possibility.
[124] Yes, she says that she looks forward to the court's substantive resolution of the issues and hopes the case will provide guidance as to how to treat the eligibility of Trump's candidacy.
[125] So in a very real way, she's saying there's a chance, or at least that she could be willing to obey a court finding that rules Trump can't be on the ballot.
[126] And that's very serious because even if the Supreme Court moves quite quickly, any amount of time when Trump is officially not on the ballot could have political implications that we've never seen before.
[127] This really is uncharted territory.
[128] Yet more uncharted territory.
[129] What if any reaction have we seen from Trump and his campaign to this effort in Colorado as well as the other efforts we see beginning in other states such as New Hampshire?
[130] They hadn't released a statement by Wednesday afternoon, but look, it's not hard to realize that they think this is ridiculous and just another piece of lawfare meant to keep Trump out of the White House by beating him in the courts instead of in the election.
[131] It seems clear that Trump will use this as further evidence of the persecution that he and his supporters see at work here.
[132] And literally keeping someone off of the ballot could be something that even independent voters view as deeply anti -democratic.
[133] So it's a risky move.
[134] It's unprecedented in modern times.
[135] But in 2023, this kind of thing almost feels normal.
[136] And we'll just have to see where it goes.
[137] Yeah, here we are again, living in the new normal.
[138] Indeed.
[139] Dave, thanks for joining us.
[140] Thanks for having me. Thanks for waking up with us.
[141] We'll be back later this afternoon with more news you need to know.