Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-OK) urged his allies in the House of Representatives to proceed cautiously with their impeachment inquiry and only send over articles if they have an air-tight case.
In an interview on Newsmax, Mullin expressed some skepticism that the current allegations being leveled against President Joe Biden by House Republicans would even qualify as impeachable offenses given that they did not occur during his presidency.
"Send us a case, make sure it's convictable," Mullin advised House Republicans. "And the bar is real high, there's no question, it's got to be a misdemeanor, a high crime, or treason. And the other bar is it has to be committed while [Biden] was in office, the current office he holds. So what he did as a vice president, what he did in between the two, may not be impeachable."
So far, allegations of wrongdoing by Biden have centered on two incidents.
The first incident centers around how Biden, during his tenure as vice president, took the lead in demanding that Ukraine fire a prosecutor whom both the United States government and other Western allies believed was not doing enough to battle corruption in the country.
Giving Biden the lead on this has been criticized as ethically problematic given that his son, Hunter Biden, was on the board of Ukrainian energy company Burisma at the time.
However, multiple witnesses have testified that firing this prosecutor was official U.S. government policy, and have said that pressure would have been brought on the Ukrainian government to do it with or without Biden's involvement.
Additionally, the prosecutor's office has confirmed that Burisma was not under investigation at the time of the American-led pressure campaign.
The second allegation of wrongdoing by Biden is that, while he was a private citizen, he accepted a repayment of a loan he gave his son to buy a truck, although it is unclear at all how such a transaction would be illegal or even ethically questionable.
In an interview on Newsmax, Mullin expressed some skepticism that the current allegations being leveled against President Joe Biden by House Republicans would even qualify as impeachable offenses given that they did not occur during his presidency.
"Send us a case, make sure it's convictable," Mullin advised House Republicans. "And the bar is real high, there's no question, it's got to be a misdemeanor, a high crime, or treason. And the other bar is it has to be committed while [Biden] was in office, the current office he holds. So what he did as a vice president, what he did in between the two, may not be impeachable."
So far, allegations of wrongdoing by Biden have centered on two incidents.
The first incident centers around how Biden, during his tenure as vice president, took the lead in demanding that Ukraine fire a prosecutor whom both the United States government and other Western allies believed was not doing enough to battle corruption in the country.
Giving Biden the lead on this has been criticized as ethically problematic given that his son, Hunter Biden, was on the board of Ukrainian energy company Burisma at the time.
However, multiple witnesses have testified that firing this prosecutor was official U.S. government policy, and have said that pressure would have been brought on the Ukrainian government to do it with or without Biden's involvement.
Additionally, the prosecutor's office has confirmed that Burisma was not under investigation at the time of the American-led pressure campaign.
The second allegation of wrongdoing by Biden is that, while he was a private citizen, he accepted a repayment of a loan he gave his son to buy a truck, although it is unclear at all how such a transaction would be illegal or even ethically questionable.
