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--:-- John Bickley: New bombshell reports pull back the curtain on the backroom negotiations between Hunter Biden's legal team and the Biden Justice Department, and the revelations are sparking massive backlash.
--:-- Georgia Howe: This fits a pattern of deception by the Biden family. We're going to continue to get the facts out to the American people. We have the details.
--:-- John Bickley: I'm Daily Wire Editor-in-Chief John Bickley with Georgia Howe. It's Monday, August 21st, and this is Morning Wire.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Former President Trump is expected to turn himself in this week for his fourth indictment. What terms are the two sides haggling over and what can we expect from the trial moving forward? And with the first GOP primary debate just days away, how is the former president and race frontrunner looking to trump those on the debate stage?
--:-- John Bickley: Plus, tropical storm Hillary hits the West Coast. Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.
--:-- Georgia Howe: A pair of blockbuster reports reveal the behind-the-scenes negotiations between Hunter Biden's legal team and the Department of Justice. The New York Times and Politico reviewed a trove of documents that reveal what led to Hunter's failed plea deal and why his lawyers are now calling foul.
--:-- John Bickley: The revelations have also added fuel to the fire of those calling the appointment of special counsel David Weiss a sham. Daily Wire reporter Tim Pierce is here to go through these reports and what they mean to the Biden case.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Hi, I'm Tim Pierce. Yeah, first off, these stories really emphasize why it's important in investigations like these to avoid conflicts of interest.
--:-- Georgia Howe: According to Politico, Hunter's legal team tried to pressure Delaware U.S. Attorney David Weiss against charging Hunter by invoking his father, the sitting president.
--:-- Tim Pierce: In October last year, Hunter's attorney Chris Clark wrote Weiss on Hunter's allegedly illegal possession of a gun. If Weiss charged Hunter on it, Clark said, quote, President Biden now unquestionably would be a fact witness for the defense in any criminal trial.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Clark later said that the spectacle of President Biden testifying at Hunter's trial would at least embarrass the Department of Justice, and it could cause a constitutional crisis with the president arguing against his own DOJ during trial.
--:-- Tim Pierce: And second, Weiss's office looked to be on board with an even lighter plea deal for Hunter until IRS whistleblowers alleged political interference from the DOJ.
--:-- Georgia Howe: It was around the time the whistleblowers came forward that negotiations between Hunter's team and Weiss's office began to derail.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Weiss, who's now the special counsel, appears to have been willing to basically let Hunter off the hook until the whistleblowers blew it all up.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Right. How did this notorious plea deal come about?
--:-- Tim Pierce: Negotiations began in May when a top Weiss lieutenant, Assistant U.S. Attorney Leslie Wolfe, went to Hunter's team with a proposal.
--:-- Georgia Howe: The plan was that Hunter wouldn't have to plead guilty to any crimes, but he would have to agree to a deferred prosecution agreement.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Hunter's attorney, Clark, then drafted an agreement several days later that said Hunter would admit he was late in paying his taxes, agree to pay what he owes, and pay his taxes on time for the next five years.
--:-- Georgia Howe: He would also give up his right to own a gun. Wolf's response was to suggest a few changes and include a statement of facts that detailed Hunter tax and gun sagas but still no guilty plea.
--:-- Tim Pierce: And in return for Hunter cooperation the two sides agreed to broad language that would protect Hunter from future DOJ prosecution for anything encompassed in the statement of facts
--:-- Georgia Howe: So the original framework for a plea deal was Hunter enters a diversion program and the DOJ drops all charges and agrees to not prosecute him for anything that they had already investigated him for.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Right. But that framework fell apart pretty soon after.
--:-- Georgia Howe: IRS supervisory agent Gary Shapley had come forward to House Republicans in April.
--:-- Tim Pierce: And then on May 15th, a story broke that a team of IRS investigators had been removed from the Hunter case.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Shapley, who had led that team, gave his first public interview to CBS on May 24th.
--:-- Tim Pierce: And all that fueled Republican accusations of special treatment.
--:-- Georgia Howe: The day before the CBS interview ran, Assistant U.S. Attorney Wolf told Clark their agreement would have to be renegotiated to include a guilty plea, among other things.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Clark was apparently furious, but the two sides worked closely from that point on to come up with that plea deal, the one that fell apart in court last month.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So this all looks very bad for President Biden, and House Republicans are now after evidence they say directly connects the president with Hunter's overseas business dealings.
--:-- Tim Pierce: What are they after?
--:-- Georgia Howe: Congressman James Comer, the chair of the House Oversight Committee, says that the president, when he was vice president, used several aliases to be kept in the loop on Hunter's business deals.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Here's what Comer told Fox News on Sunday.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Well, we've learned that Joe Biden used at least three pseudonyms or fake names in emails that he was receiving from people within the federal government, people that worked for him.
--:-- Tim Pierce: And even more troubling than that, Maria, we learned that when he was receiving emails pertaining to Ukraine, his son Hunter was copied on him.
--:-- Georgia Howe: All right, some major bombshells that raise more questions about the DOJ and Weiss being named special counsel over this case.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Tim, thanks for reporting.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Great to be on.
--:-- John Bickley: A week after being indicted for the fourth time, former President Donald Trump is set to turn himself in this week to a Fulton County court, and both sides have been negotiating over the terms of his surrender.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Here with the latest is Daily Wire senior editor Cabot Phillips.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: So Cabot, what can we expect to see in the next few days?
--:-- Georgia Howe: Well, this week for the fourth time, former President Trump will surrender himself to authorities, this time at a Fulton County jail in Atlanta.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: He has until August 25th to do so, but there's a good chance he actually turns himself in on the 23rd.
--:-- Georgia Howe: That's the day of the first GOP debate, which he reportedly plans to skip.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: While Trump has not stood for a mugshot during his first three arrests, the county sheriff in this case has said the former president will be treated like any other inmate, meaning he is likely to have a mugshot taken.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Right. And we're also going to be getting some other images of Trump throughout the trial.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Right. So this trial will also differ from the first three in that cameras will be allowed inside the courtroom.
--:-- Georgia Howe: There have been questions over whether an exception would be made for Trump, but both sides have argued publicly that they want viewers to see what's taking place in real time.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: So unless a judge rules against it, we will get to see the proceedings for ourselves.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Now that we've had time to go through the charges, how does this most recent indictment differ from the first three?
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Yeah, the big thing is that state prosecutors are charging Trump under RICO, which has traditionally been used to target gangs and organized crime.
--:-- Georgia Howe: RICO allows the state to simultaneously go after multiple defendants at once for the same charges if they can prove that each were knowingly taking part in a criminal enterprise.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: In this case, they alleging that illegal enterprise was the alleged effort to overturn the election.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Defendants charged under RICO also face stricter prison sentences, so that's a major aspect of the case as well.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: While federal prosecutors use RICO sparingly because it can be hard to score a conviction, it's much more common at the state level.
--:-- Georgia Howe: To that point, the DA in this case, Fannie Willis, has used it quite often over the last few years in a number of high-profile cases.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Now, how has the Trump team responded to the use of RICO?
--:-- Georgia Howe: So they're likely to go after the conspiracy element here.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Prosecutors allege that Trump and his 18 co-conspirators worked together with the clear goal of engaging in illegal activity.
--:-- Georgia Howe: However, Trump allies have said while the team did work together with a common goal in mind, their so-called conspiracy was not actually illegal.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: They say it's not a crime to try and keep a candidate in office.
--:-- Georgia Howe: If it were, they say Al Gore and Stacey Abrams down in Georgia would have been charged under the same law.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Expect to hear more to that effect as the case gets underway.
--:-- Georgia Howe: To that point, here's former U.S. Attorney Andrew McCarthy on Fox talking about the charges brought by D.A. Willis.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: What she really needs is a simple conspiracy that has a simple objective.
--:-- Georgia Howe: A conspiracy is simply an agreement by two or more people to violate another law, you know, some criminal law.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: And if retaining Trump in office was a crime, then she'd have an easy, simple, straight line conspiracy.
--:-- Georgia Howe: She really doesn't have that because the objective is not illegal, even if some of the means they use to try to obtain the objective may have been.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Now, before you go, talk to us a little bit about how this case is playing into the primary race.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Well, a number of polls last week showed that the majority of Americans do believe Trump broke the law in Georgia.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: 53% in a Fox poll say he acted illegally. 63% in an ABC poll say the charges are, quote, serious, while just 32% in that poll say he should not be charged.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Similarly, an Associated Press poll shows that 51% think he acted legally, while just 28% say he did nothing wrong.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: However, among GOP voters, which is, again, all that matters in a primary, Trump shows no signs of relinquishing his commanding lead.
--:-- Georgia Howe: He still sits in the 50s and even 60s in every recent poll.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: The cases do, however, seem to be impacting his general election odds.
--:-- Georgia Howe: According to that AP poll, 53% of Americans now say they would, quote, definitely not vote for Trump if he were on the ticket.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: So what's helping him with GOP voters could well be detrimental in the long run with Democrats and, more importantly, independents.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Right. That's been a big concern with a lot of conservative pundits.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Thanks for reporting.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Anytime.
--:-- John Bickley: The first Republican presidential debate will kick off in Milwaukee on Wednesday night without the frontrunner Donald Trump in attendance.
--:-- Georgia Howe: The debate arrives as Trump has extended his lead to over 30 points and as the race for second place is heating up.
--:-- John Bickley: Here to discuss the festivities is Daily Wire contributor David Marcus.
--:-- David Marcus: Hey, Dave. So before we get into Donald Trump's planned counter-programming on Wednesday night, let's look at the debate itself. What should we be watching for?
--:-- Georgia Howe: Morning, John. So to start with the candidate most have seen as Trump's most serious challenger, Ron DeSantis, A few days ago, one of his super PACs released a memo with what they recommended the Florida governor's strategy be.
--:-- David Marcus: It boiled down mainly to protecting Donald Trump from attacks and really hammering at Vivek Ramaswamy
--:-- Georgia Howe: That would make some sense as Vivek has been gaining some traction in a few polls The poll averages had DeSantis at about 15 and Ramaswamy at seven or eight.
--:-- David Marcus: DeSantis has since come out and totally dismissed the memo telling Fox on Saturday that he hasn't even read it and it was just something that, quote, we have and put off to the side, end quote.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Ramaswamy, for his part, has lashed back a bit, calling DeSantis a super pack puppet.
--:-- David Marcus: So fire up the popcorn in regard to those two.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Yeah. Now you mentioned attacks on Trump. Are those attacks most likely to come from former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie?
--:-- David Marcus: Yes, absolutely. And you can assume that those attacks will be blunt and blistering.
--:-- Georgia Howe: But don't be too surprised if Christie goes after Trump by going through DeSantis and Ramaswamy, basically saying these two guys are too afraid of Trump to tell you the truth about him.
--:-- David Marcus: And the candidates more disposed to protecting Trump are going to have to be careful not to fall into that trap, because every time they do, Christie will likely try to point it out.
--:-- Georgia Howe: And though the former governor's national numbers aren't strong, he's polling pretty well in New Hampshire, and he seems to be in position to play some kind of a spoiler role, but it's not yet clear whose candidacy he's most likely to spoil.
--:-- David Marcus: Right. Now, the other candidates on the stage will be Mike Pence, Nikki Haley, Tim Scott, and Doug Burgum, Francis Suarez hasn't managed yet to qualify as of Sunday.
--:-- Georgia Howe: What do these candidates need to do in order to break through?
--:-- David Marcus: They'll be looking for one or two really boffo moments that they can try to make go viral.
--:-- Georgia Howe: If you look at the 2020 Democrat primary, for example, in an early debate, Kamala Harris went after Joe Biden, basically calling him a racist on school busing.
--:-- David Marcus: Obviously, her poll numbers never really bounced, but it elevated her and likely played a role in her being Biden's VP choice.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So it'll be interesting to see if any of them have a bit that jumps through the screen and really grabs Republican voters.
--:-- David Marcus: All right. So now to the elephant not in the room. What should we make of Donald Trump's counter-programming? What's his plan there?
--:-- Georgia Howe: Trump will be appearing in a pre-taped interview with Tucker Carlson on Carlson's X feed, formerly known as his Twitter feed.
--:-- David Marcus: And presumably that will drop as the debate starts.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Trump's got a big lead right now, and this interview will be a much more controlled environment for him.
--:-- David Marcus: I suspect we will hear a lot about the 91 charges he's facing in a variety of jurisdictions.
--:-- Georgia Howe: But also, given that Carlson recently interviewed Hunter Biden's former business partner, Devin Archer, after his bombshell testimony before Congress, I expect Trump will hammer away at the Biden influence peddling scandal, in part because it almost cancels out his own legal woes.
--:-- David Marcus: And that goes both ways. Trump's problems are certainly used by Democrats to deflect from Biden's.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Meanwhile, lots to look forward to this week.
--:-- David Marcus: Thanks for joining us.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Thanks for having me.
--:-- John Bickley: Another story we're tracking this week. Tropical storm Hillary made landfall in Mexico on Sunday and is expected to reach California this afternoon.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Hillary's maximum sustained winds measured 70 miles per hour on Sunday, with the eye of the storm traveling northwest at 25 miles per hour.
--:-- John Bickley: Experts are warning of potentially life-threatening flash flooding in the deserts between Los Angeles and Las Vegas.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Thanks for waking up with us. We'll be back this afternoon with more of the news you need to know.
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