Hunter biden

Norm Eisen sticks his oar in

The effort to prosecute former Olympic canoeist David Hearn for damaging the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool has hit a snag. Judge Todd E. Edelman noted that the government is “operating at its own peril” if it alters the Reflecting Pool before the defense attorneys’ expert has the opportunity to sample the lining. Hearn’s lawyers filed a motion to dismiss the case on Thursday, arguing that the government had not preserved the section of pool liner that Hearn stands accused of slashing. “Despite the importance of the pool liner to the case, in the brief period since June 19, 2026, the same government that presented and returned the indictment against Mr.

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Who wants to read Joe Biden’s presidential memoir?

Joe Biden confirmed the release of his next memoir today, titled Promise Me, America, which will detail his time as president. The book is out November 17, two weeks after the midterms, and will offer the “complete story,” according to the promotional video. Promise me, America: that’s not what his autopen inscribed. “It’s about the challenges we faced as a nation,” Biden said in the video. “It’s about the decisions I made and why I made them.”  Biden’s book will address his handling of Covid-19, January 6, the retreat from Afghanistan, Ukraine and his work with NATO. It will also detail his decision to run for reelection and subsequent last-minute withdrawal.

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Does Congress need more goths?

“It could be really cool if Congress was filled with goth people,” Kelley Dennison, the 27-year-old Republican nominee for Colorado’s 2nd congressional district, told the Daily Caller. The Gen Z massage therapist is campaigning on an unexpected aesthetic, selling merchandise that tout her as “America’s Goth Baddie.” But her campaign is predicated on more than her dark eyeliner and tattoos. Dennison is “Colorado first,” running on traditional conservative and populist policies on affordability, environmental conservation and family. Though Dennison was raised in a Democratic household, she has come to believe that party’s principles “don’t pay my bills.” “Colorado won’t be gamed for political currency or an agenda.

Hunter Biden, Substackistador

Hunter Biden has worn many hats in his 56 years on Earth. Scion, serviceman (briefly), attorney, businessman, crack addict, painter and, lately, influencer. The former first son burnished his online credentials by joining Substack this week – and Cockburn welcomes his comrade. Hunter’s first meaningful post on “Where’s Hunter,” his blog on the platform, is called “It’s Dad.” The piece reads like something any other wealthy aspiring artist might shuffle up to read at an open-mic night. The sentences are short, the metaphors heavy. He muses – there is no other word for it – on the voicemail his father Joe left him and how it was heard around the world after the contents of his infamous laptop were published: The late hour. The quiet room.

Five suggestions for new 60 Minutes hosts

Starting a new job is never easy, but Nick Bilton, the new executive producer of 60 Minutes, has had an extra rough first two weeks after firing veteran correspondent Scott Pelley on Tuesday. Lesley Stahl, Jon Wertheim and Bill Whitaker released a joint memo today condemning the firings but declaring their intention to remain in post. CBS’s management has been accused of ignoring the demands of the (dwindling) core viewership and making top-down political changes to drag the station’s coverage to the right. In that spirit, Cockburn is offering Bilton some suggestions of feet to fill Pelley’s shoes. Thanks for reading Cockburn’s Diary from The Spectator. Subscribe to receive new posts and support his work.

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Trump endorses AWOL congressman Tom Kean Jr.

Today is a big day for the 2026 midterm season, with primaries in California, Iowa, Montana, New Jersey, New Mexico and South Dakota. While the national media’s attention is fixated on the Golden State’s jungle primaries for governor and LA mayor – (will it be a Pratt summer?) – a Trump endorsement in a lower-profile race caught Cockburn’s eye last night. “Congressman Tom Kean is a Great Representative for the People of New Jersey’s 7th Congressional District!” President Trump wrote on Truth Social, describing how the Republican has been “working tirelessly” to advance Trump policy goals. “GET OUT AND VOTE FOR TOM — HE WILL NEVER LET YOU DOWN!

The future belongs to Hunter Biden

As a human type Hunter Biden is familiar enough. Like George W. Bush and Ted Kennedy, he is a wayward member of a political dynasty with a strange knack for slaloming his way out of trouble. Before the internet it was much easier for such figures to go about their business. It is hard to see how the goings-on at Chappaquiddick could be covered up now, in the age of X and camera phones. It was Hunter’s misfortune to be born too late.  Dynasties are self-interested and adopt ideas based on the needs of the moment. The Habsburgs placed themselves at the head of the Counter-Reformation, and the Bushes, who were once liberal Republicans of the Nelson Rockefeller mold, later became the spokesmen of the evangelical revival. Hunter Biden is now going along in a similar vein.

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Donald’s ballroom blitz

“This is Greek… more or less… it comes out of Greece… this is the ultimate facade for Greece.” Donald Trump is wielding a blown-up graphical rendering of one of the planned porticos of the new White House ballroom. “This is a different facade,” he says, pointing to another placard propped up on an easel, “This one’s Rome.” The President spent the morning touring the ballroom’s construction site with the press. Currently a forest of rebar and metal prongs, the project has now burst its bounds and is developing into a general fortress-cum-lair. A vast underground complex is to be built below the ballroom, housing a hospital, research facilities and meeting rooms for the military.

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Melania’s $1 billion defamation suit won’t keep Hunter Biden quiet

Hunter Biden re-entered the political limelight last month on 28-year-old Andrew Callaghan's podcast, filling three hours with stories from his life, including his battle with drug addiction. Those three hours were apparently not enough. In a subsequent episode last week, Biden spent another hour giving his two cents about Jeffrey Epstein. That video has wracked up 1.3 million views and has landed him a $1 billion lawsuit from the First Lady. Melania is kindly asking Hunter to apologize for and retract the following statements: "Epstein introduced Melania to Trump. The connections are, like, so wide and deep" and "Jeffrey Epstein introduced Melania, that’s how Melania and the First Lady and the President met... Yeah, according to Michael Wolff.

hunter biden

The man to save the Democratic party: Hunter Biden

“The one thing that binds each and every one of us is not necessarily love... it’s pain,” Hunter Biden said in his interview yesterday with independent journalist Andrew Callaghan. Well, that’s good, because we’re not all sons of a former president, so at least we have something in common. Someone has really been working the 12 steps! Cockburn will admit that he didn’t really see it until now, but after yesterday, he’s ready to admit that Robert Hunter Biden may be the only person who can lead the Democratic party out of the wilderness. It’s a development worthy of the best "scion’s fiction.

Hunter Biden interview with Andrew Callaghan

Don Jr.’s Gold Rush

On the ground floor of Georgetown Park, Donald Trump Jr. is putting the finishing touches on his invitation-only club, the Executive Branch. When the doors open, reportedly in the next few weeks, it will become Washington’s new power hangout. Cabinet secretaries will mingle with tech billionaires and foreign investors, each having parted with $500,000 for the privilege. The launch party last month included Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Attorney General Pam Bondi, SEC Chairman Paul Atkins, and FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson. David Sacks, the President's crypto and AI czar, proudly announced himself as member number one. This tableau – celebrity, politics, profit – perfectly captures the Trump dynasty’s particular brand.

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Tate brothers threaten to tilt Florida governor race

Who could have predicted that a pair of (accused) sex-trafficking British-born brothers could cause such a stir in the Sunshine State? The brief return of manosphere influencers Tristan and Andrew Tate to Florida has become a flashpoint in state politics. Governor Ron DeSantis has directed his attorney general, close ally James Uthmeier, to investigate the brothers. DeSantis is thought to favor his wife Casey as a potential successor when he leaves office in 2026, as opposed to Congressman Byron Donalds, who served as a Trump campaign surrogate.

I don’t beg your pardon

The government can take away your liberty for moving furniture, I get that now. When it makes you into a liar, well, that’s a step too far. I’d explained to my five children that dad would be spending the next seventy-one days at an all-male retreat, but when I arrived at Coleman Federal Prison they immediately put me in solitary confinement. The punishment is the process, they say, unless you spend any amount of time in solitary. In that case, the punishment is the punishment. The guards no doubt wanted me to spend time in quiet reflection before granting me the privilege of engaging in fellowship with my retreat mates, a hodgepodge of petty-crime white-collar types. I had plenty of time over the next seventeen days to think about how I had arrived in sunny Sumterville.

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Trump is not fooling this time

It is said that the adage “he who hesitates is lost” is an adaptation of a line from Joseph Addison’s 1712 play Cato. I do not believe that Donald Trump is a student of the co-founder of The Spectator, but he has clearly absorbed that nugget of practical wisdom. Within hours of taking office on Monday, Trump issued some 200 executive orders and proclamations affecting the government’s conduct on everything from immigration to DEI, from energy policy to the 1,500 people incarcerated in Washington jails because they joined in the protest at the Capitol on January 6, 2021.   It is one thing to issue orders and proclamations. It is another thing to see them carried out successfully.

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Trump’s speech was one of the most rousing and substantive in American history

The mood in Washington, at least in the quarters I frequented, has been almost giddy these past few days. I watched Donald Trump’s second inauguration ceremony from the snug fastness of a secure, undisclosed location close to the White House. Joining me were about 300 politically mature citizens. Some were young, some old; some male, some female; many walks of life were represented. There were periodic cheers during the address, beginning with Trump’s declaration of “a national emergency at our southern border. “All illegal entry will immediately be halted,” he said, “and we will begin the process of returning millions and millions of criminal aliens back to the places from which they came.” My comrades liked that.

What’s going on between Brett Cooper and Candace Owens?

Brett Cooper, former host of The Comment Section on the Daily Wire, has sparked rumors after liking a controversial Instagram post by former colleague Candace Owens. Speculation follows a clip from Piers Morgan Uncensored last month in which Owens accused Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu of being a war criminal with “genocidal ambitions.” Owens told Morgan, “I want to use my platform to say that I believe they are intentionally executing a holocaust.” Cooper liking Owens’s post raised questions: does Cooper agree with Owens’s take on the war in Gaza? Could this be tied to her departure from the Daily Wire? And does she plan to collaborate with Owens moving forward?

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joe biden

Biden opens the jailhouse door

Joe Biden is not going gently into that dark night, politically or cognitively. He is going down with large, bold actions. The latest is a mass commutation for some 2,500 “nonviolent drug offenders.” Biden’s justification is that they were sentenced under laws that have now been overturned as the country has moved to more lenient treatment of all drug offenses and eliminated differences between laws penalizing crack cocaine and powdered cocaine. Those are reasonable justifications, but they are far from the whole story and far from the way the White House is selling the action to voters and friendly journalists. The vast majority of the prison terms were actually given to dealers or violent offenders, mostly members of criminal gangs.

Hunter Biden rehabbed at White House Christmas

Last night’s White House Christmas party with digital creators resulted in a cacophony of posts from social media influencers praising Hunter Biden. The swath of pro-Hunter posts following President Joe Biden’s hugely unpopular pardon of his son gave the impression that the Democrats were keen to rehab his image and tamp down accusations of nepotism. “Just met Hunter Biden at the White House Holiday Party.” Majid Padellan, or “BrooklynDad_Defiant!,” posted to his 1.2 million followers on X. “Super nice guy.”“This one is dedicated to all my favorite meme-making trolls out there!” Joanne Carducci, or “JoJoFromJerz” wrote with a picture of her and Hunter Biden. “Merry Christmas!” She has almost a million followers on X.

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Bureaucrat Main Character Syndrome is killing Ukraine — and America

Kyiv Last week, Texas congressman Pat Fallon asked why Ronald Rowe, the acting director of the US Secret Service, appeared in a 9/11 memorial photo op rather than focusing on his duty to protect Presidents Biden and Trump — just two months after an assassination attempt left Trump grazed by a bullet. Instead of addressing the concern, Rowe, an unelected bureaucrat, lashed out: “Do not invoke 9/11 for political purposes!” Citing his presence at Ground Zero on 9/11, Rowe seemed insulted by the congressman’s challenge to his judgment. But Rowe’s job wasn’t to be part of the story — it was to protect those who actually are the key players, current and former presidents.

Joe Biden breaks his promise and pardons Hunter

President Joe Biden announced Sunday that he pardoned his son, Hunter Biden, sparing him ahead of sentencing for felony tax and gun crimes. The ne’er-do-well was potentially facing years of jail time after pleading guilty to nine federal tax charges and getting convicted of three felony gun offenses. “Today, I signed a pardon for my son Hunter. From the day I took office, I said I would not interfere with the Justice Department’s decision-making, and I kept my word even as I have watched my son being selectively, and unfairly, prosecuted,” Biden said in a statement released Sunday night. He also alleged that the judicial process had been tainted by politics and was worried that investigations and prosecutions against his son would continue after his presidency.

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