During Hunter Biden’s trial, WorldNetDaily ran outside articles like a HotAir column by Karen Townsend headlined “Are the Bidens intimidating Hunter’s jury?” The column snippet WND stole from HotAir didn’t supply the answer. It wasn’t until the trial ended that the original content started coming. A June 11 article by Bob Unruh summarized the verdict:
Hunter Biden is facing a possible penalty of years in prison after a jury convicted him on three federal gun charges.
After only about three hours of deliberating, the jury returned the verdict Tuesday.
The charges stem from his purchase of a firearm in 2018 at a time when he was addicted to crack cocaine. They stem from his claim, on a required federal form, that he was not addicted or under the influence of drugs, a statement required to qualify for a gun purchase.
The jury convicted him of making a false statement for a firearms purchase, making a false statement for the transaction record, and illegally possessing a firearm.
Hunter Biden also faces a looming trial on tax charges, and could face even more court dates, as Congress has referred him to the Department of Justice or perjury.
Then the columnists started weighing in. A June 13 column by Larry Elder whined that some claimed Hunter’s trial proved the justice system works, contrary to claims by Donald Trump and his supporters:
Hold the confetti.
Given the array of serious crimes allegedly committed by Biden family members, Hunter’s gun conviction represents the equivalent of nailing Al Capone over unpaid parking tickets.
[…]Finally, the “no such thing as an anti-Trump two-tiered system of justice” crowd must explain the special counsel’s refusal to charge Joe Biden with illegal possession of classified documents, going as far back as when he served in the Senate. But Trump, for allegedly violating the same Espionage Act, remains on the hook.
Elder didn’t mention that the main reason is that Biden cooperated with authorities over the documents while Trump didn’t, resulting in the famous FBI raid at Mar-a-Lago.
Robert Knight attempted a similar argument in his June 17 column:
Don’t be fooled by Hunter Biden ‘s conviction this past week on three gun charges.
Sure, he’s guilty, but it’s just a distraction, like the Monica Lewinsky case during the Clinton administration. More on that later.
The real scandals involving the Biden family, China, Ukraine, Russia, 20 shell bank accounts and possibly President Biden himself, are being ignored by the Justice Department and the media.
[…]Special counsel David Weiss has done everything possible to avoid prosecuting the real crimes. He slow walked investigations, let statutes of limitation run out and even tipped off the Biden lawyers about classified documents at the Biden home and office.
Contrast that with the FBI’s actually raiding President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home, as well as the homes of several of his former aides.
[…]Contrast this with former President Trump, who was impeached twice on trumped up charges. Now, along with his loss in a New York civil case that had no victims, he faces prison time and hundreds of millions in fines. Meanwhile, Democrats are prosecuting him in three more courts.
James Zumwalt spent his June 19 column cheering the conviction and ranting about Hunter’s infamous laptop, which he claims contains evidence of “459 crimes, both state and federal, Hunter may have committed.” He also complained that the “Group of 51” national security officials who signed a letter saying the laptop looked like Russian disinformation “have suffered no consequences for their wrong call”; He didn’t mention that the New York Post, which broke the story, offered no independent verification of the story that would have dispelled concerns about its authenticity and counter the fact that the Post is a right-wing, pro-Trump rag. Zumwalt concluded by cheering: “Hopefully, Hunter’s gun conviction is just the tip of the criminal activity iceberg for him. Throughout his life, his despicable behavior has been facilitated by his father and numerous other individuals both in and out of government seeking to ride Joe’s coattails. While the group of 51 has learned nothing about accountability, at least Hunter, at age 54, has.”