Rightwing politicians repeat unfounded theories that gun trial verdict is a ‘distraction’ from worse Biden crimes

Republicans responded to Hunter Biden’s conviction on Tuesday of lying about his drug use to buy a gun by doubling down on conspiracy theories that many senior party figures have been using to try and damage his president father.

Despite the fact that Joe Biden’s son could now face a hefty jail sentence, Donald Trump’s election campaign and its surrogates repeated unfounded attack lines that the conviction was part of a conspiracy to deflect attention from more serious crimes and represented the use of the Department of Justice (DoJ) as a political weapon.

Republicans have long sought to use Hunter Biden’s woes and business dealings as a political weapon against Biden, ignoring the fact that Trump himself is also now a convicted felon whose own business empire has been fined hundreds of millions of dollars for fraudulent practises.

That tactic continued in the wake of Hunter’s guilty verdict.

  • MudMan@fedia.io
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    6 months ago

    Gotta say, for a guy they keep presenting as a senile, barely-functional bumbling idiot, orchestrating a trial to throw your own son in jail just to generate a distraction is kinda badass.

    Some real “getting captured was my plan all along” energy right there.

  • Nusm@yall.theatl.social
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    6 months ago

    They had two talking points ready to go depending on the outcome. Talking Point A, he’s acquitted so the whole thing is rigged against Trump, and Taking Point B, he’s convicted, but it was all a sham to make Trump look bad.

    It doesn’t matter what happens in any situation, Repubs go to their spreadsheet, look up the talking point they need to use to make themselves look like the victim, and spread it. Rinse, lather, repeat.

    • Rhaedas@fedia.io
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      6 months ago

      The embarrassing thing is when they don’t all get the latest changes and get out of sync on the current talking points. Republicans, always do an update refresh before speaking!

      It’s the old line about telling lies and having to keep track of them…much easier to just stick with reality and the facts.

      • Wrench@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        You can see the syncing happen in real time when something big and unexpected happens, and it takes about 24h for them to get the narrative straight.

        When the Pelosi attack happened, I was curious and monitored r/conservative.

        For the first 12h or so, they were for the most part human. Most highly rated comments were along the lines of “I don’t agree with her politics, but this is wrong.”

        There were still a few comments celebrating the attack with mixed votes.

        Then about 12 hrs in, conspiracy theories started trickling in with mixed reactions ranging from gleeful excitement to disgust.

        24h in, all of the respectful comments were buried to oblivion, and the conspiracy theories and comments celebrating violence had fully taken over.

        It was both enlightening and absolutely repulsive to watch how their propaganda worked in real time.

    • HubertManne@moist.catsweat.com
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      6 months ago

      talking point c, he is executerd because they wanted to use his blood in a ritual at a pizza hut to make children more susceptible to pedos.

  • MasterBlaster@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    They cannot celebrate his conviction because that would undermine their assertion that the trump trial was rigged.

    In a twisted way, their reaction makes sense, and for me, was predictable. The cult must be constantly managed for it to remain intact.

    • Enk1@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      The collective confusion and mental gymnastics to twist it when Republicans heard about the Hunter Biden conviction cost the US billions in lost productivity.

      • Nastybutler@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        We could have unlimited free energy if only we could figure out how to harness it from republicans doing mental gymnastics

    • jballs
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      6 months ago

      You’ve gotta think they had two folders for “Talking points if Hunter is found Not Guilty” and “Talking points if Hunter is found Guilty”.

      And both folders contained the same message: “The system is rigged!”

  • Todd Bonzalez@lemm.ee
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    6 months ago

    It is funny the timing of all this. Republicans went after Hunter Biden because they were convinced that they could make Joe Biden look bad if he had a criminal son.

    But very little of Hunter’s issues have meaningfully rubbed off on Joe, outside of the more conspiratorial conservatives whose opinions of Joe Biden were bad to begin with.

    But now that they got what they wanted, and Hunter is a convicted felon, it has completely taken the wind out of the “Joe Biden controls the justice system to persecute his rivals” narrative that they want to push after Donald Trump’s felony conviction.

    And they can’t even lay into Hunter Biden as a distraction because he was convicted of gun crimes.

      • azimir@lemmy.ml
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        6 months ago

        Why do you think they buy such ridiculously large vehicles? It’s to make moving the goalposts faster.

    • Asafum@feddit.nl
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      6 months ago

      it has completely taken the wind out of the “Joe Biden controls the justice system to persecute his rivals” narrative

      Says who? When in their entire history have they been logically consistent? They’ll still argue it’s rigged even if every single Democrat was arrested because one of their own got caught too.

      • Todd Bonzalez@lemm.ee
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        6 months ago

        Look, stupidity is a spectrum, and the less traction the lie has, the fewer stupid people will believe it. I’ll take what I can get.

  • Delusional@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    “republicans cause more problems for no reason because they are fucking jackasses and a threat to America.”

    Fixed the headline.

  • ReallyActuallyFrankenstein@lemmynsfw.com
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    6 months ago

    So the prosecution of Trump is a political move, meant to create negative attention on Trump. And the prosecution of Hunter Biden is a political move, meant to draw attention away from Trump.

    Ok.

  • givesomefucks@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    This is why what Republicans might say should never factor into what rational people do.

    No matter what happens, they’re gonna make up some bullshit to fearmonger.

    They call Biden a communist extremist that will make college free, tax the rich, and give us free healthcare…

    So like, why not just run someone that actually wants all that stuff for Americans?

    Even if Dems don’t fight for, republicans will say we are.

    • Cryophilia@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      Because the great mass of politically uninformed people sometimes believe them, so we have to pay attention to what they say.

    • drcobaltjedi@programming.dev
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      6 months ago

      Yesterday as I was helping someone with their computer a couple of coworkers were talking about how the hunter biden trial was super quick compared to trumps and yadda yadda yadda. Its mind boggling. Like, guys you got what you wanted. You can legally say Hunter is a criminal without it being libel/slander. Hes a felon now. What did this accomplish exactly now that hes a criminal? Hes still not on any ballot. Hes still a fail son, but like he’s not doing anything.

      • palordrolap@kbin.run
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        6 months ago

        In their minds, being the antithesis of Trump, a man who clearly doesn’t give two hoots about his own kids, Joe Biden must therefore care so much that it would destroy him for his son to be a felon.

        To those, Biden not stepping down or suffering some kind of breakdown after the verdict must have been at least a momentary confusion.

        OR, more likely, it’s as simple as they’re running “Like father, like son” in reverse. Son’s a criminal, therefore so is Joe.

        Of course if they themselves have criminal offspring, that’d be completely irrelevant. Merely a hiccup.

    • Chainweasel@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      But it did go their way, they’re just pissed because the timing of when it went their way totally undermines their talking points about Trump and his trial.

      • Franklin@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        Yeah sorry I should have been more clear that’s what I meant, but it didn’t go exactly the way they imagined in their head

        • MagicShel@programming.dev
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          6 months ago

          Are you saying your initial comment didn’t go your way? That sounds like a false flag operation! The enemy is inside your brain!

          • AbidanYre@lemmy.world
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            6 months ago

            The enemy is inside your brain!

            I don’t think the guy you’re responding to is RFK Jr.

    • RaoulDook@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      “Everything is a conspiracy” is the go-to method they use to not cope with reality, ever since trump got them hooked on conspiracy theories.

  • pubquiz@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    If they weren’t consistently stupid, the MAGAt’s would really have nothing to bind them.

  • thesporkeffect@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    God damn this is just so embarrassing. I hate both of these idiots and hope they drown in a grease trap, but I would feel less bad for them if they cut off their own hand on live TV.