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.

The whole self-proclaimed White Dudes against Trump posse joined the fun as well. “Got to meet Hunter Biden today!” Harry Sisson posted. “He’s awesome. The whole Biden family is amazing and I appreciate them a lot.”

Hunter received a pardon for a conviction on federal gun charges — after he was found guilty of lying on a federal form about his drug use to purchase a firearm — and for a guilty plea in relation to federal tax evasion. The pardon went back to any of Hunter’s potential crimes dating back to 2014, leading many to speculate that it was intended as carte-blanche protection of any damaging findings from further investigation of the Biden family’s foreign business dealings. That didn’t stop BlueAnon social media from posting glowing praise of the First Failson. 

Chris Mowrey posted: “Met Hunter Biden tonight. Great guy. Great family!” 

Dean Withers has a selfie with Hunter and the caption reads “2 free men.” Classic.

Their friend Chris @parkergetajob sent out another selfie with a “Got to meet Hunter Biden thanks for pardoning him Joe!”

The whole group garners much attention on TikTok especially. Writer and influencer Allison Gill posted a picture of her and Hunter on Bluesky (an alternative to X) with the caption, “Honored to discuss recovery benefits for veterans in the Los Angeles VA health system with Hunter Biden today. It’s amazing how much he sounds like his dad.”

Content creator Sari Beth Rosenberg joined in on the Bluesky fun and posted: “Hung out with Hunter Biden today at the White House,” with a picture.

Some, including Brent Scher from the Daily Wire, half-joked that the influencers were probably given a script from the White House. Whether or not that’s true, it wouldn’t be the first time influencers have been deployed by the Democratic Party. The Democratic National Convention Committee credentialed over 200 content creators in August, and Joe Biden was looking to hire a memelord back in May. Both Sisson and Padellan have received money from liberal super PACs in the past, with Sisson receiving $13,000 in 2023, and Padellan receiving $57,088 in 2020.

-Cockburn

On our radar

OPEN THE FLOOD-GAETZ In a major reversal, the House Ethics Committee voted Wednesday to release a report about former representative Matt Gaetz reportedly having a sexual relationship with a seventeen-year-old after previously declining to make the report public. Gaetz resigned from Congress earlier this year after his nomination to be Trump’s attorney general, after which he eventually withdrew his name from contention. 

COLORS OF THE WIND Team Trump responded to Senator Elizabeth Warren sending a letter to the president-elect calling for “conflict of interest” rules for Tesla and X CEO Elon Musk. Trump press secretary Karoline Leavitt mockingly called her “Pocahontas” and said that she is a “career politician whose societal impact is 1/1024th of Elon Musk’s.” 

SPIKE MIKE Conservative Republicans in Congress are turning on Speaker Mike Johnson amid his attempts to pass a 1,500 page continuing resolution to fund the government through March. Representative Thomas Massie revealed Wednesday that he will not vote for Johnson for speaker in the new term. 

Trump stacks roster of ambassadors

President-elect Trump announced Tuesday he would nominate former Senate candidate and NFL player Herschel Walker to serve as his ambassador to the Bahamas.

“Herschel has spent decades serving as an Ambassador to our Nation’s youth, our men and women in the Military, and athletes at home and abroad,” Trump posted on Truth Social.

Trump also noted Walker’s previous administration gig as the co-chair of the President’s Council on Sports, Fitness and Nutrition. Critics note that Walker has neither clear ties to the archipelago nor diplomatic experience. (Others suggest that it’s a symbolic, geopolitically meaningless position, ridiculing the indignation.)

While picking a former football star is novel, selecting friends and donors to these positions is not. Biden, for instance, chose Comcast executive David Cohen as his ambassador pick for Canada; Cohen’s more than $500,000 in donations to Democrats may have had something to do with his nomination.

Other recent Trump ambassador picks include former investment bank president George Glass for Japan; Leah Francis Campos, a former senior advisor to the House Foreign Affairs Commitee and sister of Fox News host Rachel Campos-Duffy, for the Dominican Republic; and fellow businessman and golfer Lou Rinaldi for Uruguay.

–Juan P. Villasmil

Pelosi flexes muscles on Oversight

Even with a broken hip, Nancy Pelosi is still running the show and earning scorn from left-wing activists in the process. 

The octogenarian veteran stock trader already ousted President Joe Biden from their party’s primary process — this week, she reportedly stymied one of her party’s youngest talents from climbing to the top spot on the Oversight Committee. Pelosi’s efforts to keep a septuagenarian as the ranking member of a high-profile committee come as several other longtime and elderly committee leaders have been dumped in favor of younger opponents.

Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez failed to beat Congressman Gerry Connolly in multiple rounds of voting that took place solely among House Democrats. And the results have both companies such as Raytheon and Republicans ecstatic while leaving an already demoralized left-wing even further in the dumps.

Connolly is a longtime ally of military contractors, and Republicans are glad to see that AOC and her massive megaphone aren’t getting a huge leg up during the second Trump presidency. AOC, several top Hill staffers noted, has become a far savvier player than she was in 2019. 

Perhaps the group most disappointed by AOC’s defeat, and by Connolly specifically being chosen to run the Oversight Committee Democrats, are the commenters on the Dear White Staffers blog. The page is riddled with “antisemitic” and anti-Israel content — and a recent post filled with anonymous attacks on Connolly that called him a “total creeper” and a diva. Several posts attacked him for his Covid-era policies, where he made his staff work in person despite supporting lavish telework policies for others in the federal government.

The most sensational allegation is that a staffer of his “had to leave his office because he became obsessed with her. She went to an agency and he would call that federal agency asking for her.”

Another commenter echoed the allegation. “I can confirm this,” they wrote. “This person is a top professional and was a great staffer. He called her new boss and tried to discredit her professionally after she’d been hired. Total creeper 🤮” 

The Spectator cannot speak to the veracity of the anonymous claims. Yet perhaps the oversight that Connolly should focus on first is that of his own office…

–Matthew Foldi

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