The Daily Signal - Hunter Biden makes surprise appearance before Oversight Committee, Top House Democrat says Biden should evaluate firing Austin, US and UK repel largest Houthi attack yet on Red Sea shipping, House holds hearing on impeaching Mayorkas | Jan. 10

Episode Date: January 10, 2024

TOP NEWS | On today’s Daily Signal Top News, we break down: Hunter Biden’s surprise appearance before the House Oversight Committee that was voting to hold him in contempt of Congress A top House Democrat saying President Biden should evaluate firing Defense Secretary Austin after he went missing for several days The US and UK repelling the largest Houthi drone and missile attack yet on commercial ships moving through the Red Sea The House Homeland Security Committee holding a hearing to discuss why it should recommend impeaching Homeland Security Secretary Mayorkas over his mishandling of the border crisis Relevant Links Listen to other podcasts from The Daily Signal: https://www.dailysignal.com/podcasts/ Get daily conservative news you can trust from our Morning Bell newsletter: DailySignal.com/morningbellsubscription   Listen to more Heritage podcasts: https://www.heritage.org/podcasts Sign up for The Agenda newsletter — the lowdown on top issues conservatives need to know about each week: https://www.heritage.org/agenda Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I'm Brian Gottstein, and this is the Daily Signal Top News for Wednesday, January 10th. Here are today's headlines. In a chaotic day on Capitol Hill on Wednesday, the House Committee leading the impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden advanced a contempt of Congress resolution against the President's son Hunter. After openly defying a subpoena last year from the House Oversight Committee, the younger Biden surprisingly showed up in the hearing room ahead of the contempt. vote with two lawyers. According to the Daily Signals, Fred Lucas, Florida Republican Representative Byron Donald said the president's son expects to follow a different set of rules. He stated that there was a subpoena and he didn't answer it and any other American would be held in contempt by Congress. Representative Jared Moskowitz, a Democrat of Florida, leapt to Hunter Biden's defense

today saying that the committee could hear from Hunter Biden while he was in the room. But Biden and his lawyers actually walked out of the room when Georgia Republican representative Marjorie Taylor Green began to speak. Biden's lawyer told reporters outside the hearing room that Biden is a private citizen, but despite that, Republicans have sought to use him as a surrogate to attack his father, President Joe Biden. Contempt of Congress is a violation of the law, similar to contempt of court. On December 13th, the day the subpoena directed him to appear before the Oversight Committee for a closed-door deposition, Hunter Biden instead gave remarks outside of the Capitol, defying the subpoena. His lawyer said he would appear in public testimony only.

The full House will vote on the contempt resolution next week. On CNN Tuesday, House Armed Services Committee, ranking member Representative Adam Smith, a Democrat representing the state of Washington, stated that President Joe Biden needs to evaluate his relationship with Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin. Smith said Biden should consider firing Austin if he doesn't have a plausible answer as to why he didn't inform the White House that he was hospitalized for prostate cancer surgery in December, and then again for several days in January from complications after the surgery. The president wasn't informed of Austin's cancer diagnosis until Tuesday, several weeks after the initial surgical procedure, the White House said.

Breitbart reported that Smith said he thought Austin had done a great job as Secretary of Defense, but that the U.S. is in a very difficult national security situation and that there's no excuse for not having informed the president that he had cancer and that he was hospitalized in having surgery. Smith added that we need Austin to answer the question, why did he think it was appropriate for him not to tell the president? He also said he couldn't imagine a plausible explanation that justifies Austin's decision to keep quiet.

Naval forces from the U.S. and the United Kingdom have repelled the largest attack yet on Red Sea shipping by Yemen's Houthi rebels, according to U.K. Defense Secretary Grant Shaps. According to the BBC, carrier-based jets and warships on Tuesday shot down 21 drones and missiles launched by the Iran-back Houthis. The Houthis claimed that they targeted a U.S. ship in retaliation for the killing of rebels who tried to attack a container ship last month. The U.S. military said the Houthis have carried out 26 attacks on commercial shipping in the Red Sea since November 19th. The U.S. military said Iranian designed one-way attack drones, anti-ship cruise missiles, and anti-ship ballistic missiles were launched from Houthi-controlled

areas of Yemen toward international shipping lanes in the southern Red Sea on Tuesday. According to Reuters, the Houthis who control most of Yemen have been targeting Red Sea shipping routes to show their support for Hamas. The BBC reported that a Houthi spokesman reiterated that the Houthis would continue to prevent Israeli ships from navigating in both the red and Arabian seas until Israel ends what he says is its aggression on Gaza. House Republicans initiated impeachment proceedings Wednesday against Homeland Security Secretary, Alejandro Majorcas for allowing millions of illegal aliens to enter the United States. During a House Homeland Security Committee hearing chaired by Representative Mark Green, a Tennessee Republican, lawmakers discussed the need to impeach and remove Majorcas from office in the wake of the historic crisis at the southern border. The Daily Signals, Jarrett Stepman, reports that

Green said Majorcas intentionally created conditions for chaos at the border that led millions of illegal immigrants from around the world to cross-interested. of the country in an unprecedented and wholly avoidable crisis. Green said that between February 2021 and November 2023, Customs and Border Protection recorded more than 8.1 million encounters of inadmissible aliens at our borders nationwide, including more than 6.7 million at the southwest border alone. He also said Mayarchus repeatedly had misled the American public in Congress.

He stated that Mayorkas is refuted. to follow the law is sufficient grounds for impeachment proceedings, and that the founders designed impeachment not just to remove officials for criminal behavior, but those guilty of such gross incompetence that their conduct had endangered their fellow Americans, betrayed the American trust, or represented a neglect of duty. Representative Benny Thompson, a Democrat from Mississippi, said that the Republicans plan to impeach and remove Mayorkas is about appealing to campaign donors. He said Majorcas has done an excellent job keeping the border secure.

Despite what Republicans would have you believe, he said, Secretary Mayorkas is enforcing immigration law. And that'll do it for today's episode. Thank you for listening to the Daily Signal's top news. If you haven't gotten a chance, be sure to check out our morning show right here in this podcast feed, where we interview lawmakers, experts, and leading conservative voices. Join us tomorrow morning for the Daily Signal interview edition. Rob Bluey is interviewing Marissa Strait, the CEO of Prager You.

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