WASHINGTON – A White House Republican critic of President Biden’s impeachment inquiry is considering leaving Congress for a new post – and has expressed interest in becoming an on-air commentator for CNN, The Post has learned.
Rep. Ken Buck (R-Colo.), a five-term fiscal peddler, has surprised fellow conservatives by repeatedly criticizing the investigation launched last week into Biden’s alleged corruption, including with the Sept. 15 The Washington Post op-ed that other Republicans said included significant inaccuracies.
Buck said privately last month that he was interested in a job at CNN, sources told The Post, after he considered other options over the past year — including joining a D.C.-based law firm or seeking Biden’s nomination to the Federal Trade Commission.
Buck, 64, confirmed to The Post he was exploring his options and said it would be “great” to join CNN.
“I’m interested in talking to people at CNN and other news organizations — directly, I don’t want to call them left, but sort of center-left — and having the opportunity to do that full-time or do that as a contributor would be great,” Buck said in telephone interview.
Representative Ken Buck says he is looking to join CNN after his decade in Congress.Bloomberg via Getty Images
The congressman called back later that day to say he had also expressed interest in a position at right-leaning Fox News or Newsmax.
“I don’t want to give you the impression that I’m only talking to people on CNN, on the left. I have also talked to other people about this,” said Buck.
Buck represents a vast rural district that spans the entire Rocky Mountain State’s eastern border and said Tuesday that it was unclear whether he would leave office “this Congress, the next Congress or whatever — but [I have] just really exploring the possibilities … putting some different things together before I go.”
Sources familiar with Buck’s considerations scoffed at the prospect of him working for either Fox News or Newsmax, arguing that Fox “didn’t need” him and that a smaller network would likely pay badly.
“His voters chose him to do the job now – not go looking for a TV contract, not try to audition for the next job,” the source said. “People can debate whether he changed his tune or not [about politics]but I think a lot of people would say he probably has.”
Buck has criticized the Republican impeachment inquiry into Joe Biden. AFP via Getty Images
In recent weeks, Buck has emerged as a leading critic of the impeachment inquiry centered on Biden’s allegations related to his son Hunter and brother James’ efforts in countries such as China and Ukraine during his vice presidency.
Ian Sams, a spokesman for the White House counsel’s office, has tweeted Buck’s statement five times since Sunday.
A GOP congressional source told The Post that it’s “clear” that Buck is exploring career options — after former Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) previously emerged as another top Republican on-air critic before joining CNN in January.
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Buck’s Washington Post op-ed especially angered fellow Republicans.
In it, he wrote that there was “no evidence” that Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin was “involved in the investigation of Burisma,” the natural gas company that paid Hunter Biden a $1 million salary, when he was fired.
Shokin was fired by a vote of the Kyiv parliament on March 29, 2016 — less than two months after he seized the assets of Burisma owner Mykola Zlochevsky as part of a corruption case.
Biden then bragged about forcing Ukraine’s hand by using a $1 billion US loan guarantee as leverage to remove Shokin from office.
Recently published email correspondence shows that National Security Council staff were surprised in late January 2016 that Biden would link Shokin’s removal to US aid.
“I sat with [House impeachment inquiry] investigators after I wrote the op-ed,” Buck told The Post on Tuesday. “It was one of those things where I wrote an op-ed, submitted it to the Washington Post and sat down with the investigator — and it was published after I met with the investigator.”
Buck said he remains unconvinced that Shokin was ousted because of his investigation into Burisma. An unproven FBI whistleblower tip said that Zlochevsky in 2016 claimed he was “forced” to pay $10 million to Joe and Hunter Biden in exchange for Shokin’s firing.
Other Republicans also took issue with Buck writing that “[t]he GOP charge against Biden is that he personally benefited from his son’s deplorable business exploits” but “[w]the missing hat, despite years of investigation, is the smoking gun linking Joe Biden to the corruption of his ne’er-do-well son.”
But his GOP colleagues argue that corruption may still exist without evidence of funds flowing to Joe Biden if he as vice president influenced US policy to benefit his relatives.
The House Oversight Committee is in the process of issuing a subpoena for the bank records of Hunter and James Biden to determine if any foreign income flowed to their powerful relatives.
A panel in May profiled nine Biden relatives who allegedly received foreign funds.
Buck said he remains unconvinced that Viktor Shokin was ousted because of his investigation into Burisma. LightRocket via Getty Images
Buck is a member of the hardline conservative Freedom Caucus and said he may still vote to impeach Biden depending on how the investigation goes.
“I’m a prosecutor, so I’ve been beaten in court when there’s missing evidence,” he said. “So I might be too cautious in this case. But it was very clear to me that something was off — that there was smoke.
“I’m not against the impeachment, I’m against the impeachment inquiry because I don’t think it gives us broader powers to investigate this,” Buck added.
“I think the three investigations — Judiciary, Oversight and Ways and Means — revealed a lot of very good information. And I think other information might change my mind and convince me that there should be a dismissal.”
Buck said he is interested in learning more about why Russian billionaire Yelena Baturina has escaped US sanctions imposed on Russia’s business elite after transferring $3.5 million in 2014 to a corporate entity partially controlled by Hunter Biden before dining at least once with Joe Biden in DC.
The Colorado representative, who has a special interest in antitrust policy, told The Post that he spoke with two senators this year about the possibility of being nominated by Biden to be one of two Republicans on the five-member FTC, but chose not to pursue it further.
Buck, a grandfather of six, also said he doesn’t want to serve in Congress into his 80s — unlike some of its more prominent members.
“I never thought of this job as a job as a career — as a job I wanted to do for decades. … Do I want to stay here long? The answer is no, I don’t,” he said.
“I want to make an impact. I want to represent my constituents in my state and this country well, and then I want to walk away from that and move on to other challenges.”
Buck said he’s interested in CNN’s potential role, in part, because, “I feel like members of Congress pick silos that they want to talk about and then they compete with each other to try to be more to the right or more to the left. … I think it’s important for us to come out of our tents and try to move more people in, or convince more people that we are rational and have good arguments to support our position.”
A CNN spokeswoman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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Source: thtrangdai.edu.vn/en/
