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Gene Zitver: Is the end of Ben Cline’s corruption crusade? (Hint: probably not)

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Rather than working on the everyday needs of his constituents – for good-paying jobs, quality health care, affordable housing and secure retirements – Sixth District Congressman Ben Cline has devoted an awful lot of his time and effort over the past year to a partisan effort to uncover corrupt connections between President Biden and his family.

As a member of the House Judiciary Committee, Cline has been a loyal accomplice of chairman Jim Jordan in his attempt to find Biden-related criminality.

In June 2023 Cline identified Gal Luft, who claimed to have evidence against the Bidens, as a “brave whistleblower.” A month later Luft was indicted for acting as an unregistered agent for Chinese companies and for brokering arms deals between those companies, Iran and countries in the Middle East.

And that, apparently, was the last time Cline ever mentioned the “brave whistleblower” Luft.

This month, in a typically unchallenging interview by Maria Bartiromo on Fox Business, Cline claimed that Tony Bobulinski, a former business associate of Hunter Biden, gave the House Oversight and Accountability Committee “very damning testimony” against the Bidens. He left no doubt that he thinks President Biden should be impeached for bribery.

But CNN reported:

Over the past several years, Tony Bobulinski has seemingly shared his story with anyone who would listen, including the Trump campaign. But his loftiest claims — that Joe Biden was deeply involved in his son’s overseas business deals — are still uncorroborated and have been undercut by other key witnesses.

And ABC News reported:

The transcript of Bobulinski’s appearance appears to show that when pressed, Bobulinski — who [Oversight Committee Chairman James] Comer has described as “the one honest, credible guy that was involved with the Bidens” — could not point to direct evidence that Joe Biden was involved in his family’s business dealings.

And now yet another supposedly key witness against the Bidens– Alexander Smirnov– has been charged with lying about the family’s business dealing in Ukraine. Not only that, Smirnov told investigators that Russian intelligence officials provided him with misinformation about Hunter Biden.

Prosecutors also said Alexander Smirnov has been “actively peddling new lies that could impact US elections” after meeting with Russian spies late last year and that the fallout from his previous false bribery accusations about the Bidens “continue[s] to be felt to this day.”

So what now, Congressman Cline? It would be nice to think that you and your Republican colleagues will end your fruitless crusade to find evidence of corruption against the President.

But I’m afraid we know better by now.

Gene Zitver is the editor of ClineWatch.

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