Biden Impeachment Fails

On February 15, news broke that Alexander Smirnov, the informant relied on by Republicans for the “evidence” that then–vice president Joe Biden and his son had each taken a $5 million bribe from the Ukrainian oil and gas company Burisma, had been indicted by a federal grand jury for lying and “creating a false and fictitious record.”

The Republicans key witness against the Biden Family was arrested by the Trump-appointed Special Counsel David Weiss of the Justice Department. Weiss filed a document establishing that the informant, Alexander Smirnov, provided false information and has “extensive and extremely recent” ties with “Russian intelligence agencies. He is actively peddling new lies that could impact U.S. elections after meeting with Russian intelligence officials in November.”

House leaders have quietly deleted from their House Impeachment website the Russian disinformation that previously was central to their case against Biden.

Trump-appointed Special Counsel David Weiss of the Justice Department even filed a document concluding that Smirnov has “extensive and extremely recent” ties with “Russian intelligence agencies.”

Representative Jamie Raskin (D-MD), the top Democrat on the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, told reporters that “the impeachment investigation essentially ended yesterday, in substance if not in form, with the explosive revelation that Mr. Smirnov’s allegations about Ukrainian Burisma payments to Joe Biden were concocted along with Russian intelligence agents. And it appears like the whole thing was not only obviously false and fraudulent but a product of Russian disinformation and propaganda. And that’s been the motor force behind this investigation for more than a year.”

Speaker Johnson is refusing to take up a measure to aid Ukraine in its resistance to Russia’s 2022 invasion.