After making claims of conduct that would be deeply concerning of any elected official, much less the President of the United States, several Republicans began walking back some of their certainty over corruption allegations regarding President Joe Biden.
The allegations stem from a tip that Republicans say was received by the FBI in 2020 from a foreign national who claimed to have tapes of conversations with Biden from his time as Vice President under Barack Obama.
The tipster said they tendered a $5 million bribe to Biden in return for influence over policy.
However, the existence of those recordings has quickly come into question with several Republicans forced to admit that they could not substantiate those claims personally.
“We don’t know for sure if these tapes exist,” Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio said Wednesday to reporters who asked if they were considering impeaching the current President.
The sentiment was then echoed by Rep. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin.
“We don't know really if the tapes exist, whether this was just a bluff on the part of, whoever the executive was, I think it was Mykola Zlochevsky, the CEO of the... the corrupt oligarch,” he said.
Rep. James Comer of Kentucky, the chair of the House Oversight Committee, elaborated even further during an appearance on Fox News.
“Unfortunately, nobody's had any contact with him for the last three years,” Comer said of the tipster.
Since taking majority control of the U.S. House of Representatives after the 2022 mid-term elections, Republicans have undertaken several investigations into Biden’s past alleged dealings with foreign businessmen as well as those of his family, particularly his son Hunter.
The G.O.P. appears to be redoubling those efforts in the wake of multiple indictments of former President Donald Trump, who remains the potential favorite for the Republican Presidential nomination again in 2024.
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