As Hunter Biden's sweetheart plea deal to avoid jail time or any real consequences for lying on his taxes and illegally obtaining a firearm showed signs of falling apart in a Delaware courtroom on Wednesday morning, the First Family's loyal defenders at CNN were beside themselves trying to understand the unfolding reality.
"Someone made a bad mistake here," host John Berman declared, stating the obvious. "How could there be such a big miscommunication?" pondered his cohost.
Eli Honig, a CNN legal commentator, came up empty too.
"I cannot even begin to explain how the Justice Department walks into that courtroom without knowing exactly what the scope of immunity or coverage is for Hunter Biden and, equally, I cannot even begin to understand how Hunter Biden's lawyers walk him into that courthouse without knowing exactly what the constraints, what the limitations of that deal are," Honig said.
CNN: "Someone made a bad mistake here."
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) July 26, 2023
"How could there be such a big miscommunication?!"
"I cannot even begin to understand how Hunter Biden's lawyers walk him into that courthouse without knowing exactly what the constraints, what the limitations of that deal are!" pic.twitter.com/2XP9ZmsWtF
Presumably, after years of apparent work by Biden allies to protect Hunter and the rest of the family from the consequences of their actions, both Hunter's legal team and the prosecutors who agreed to the sweetheart deal assumed that things would be smooth sailing on Wednesday. They just didn't expect a judge to scrutinize the deal.
What both the Justice Department's lawyers and Hunter's legal team apparently were not in agreement on dealt with potential future prosecution of Hunter Biden. Specifically, would the plea deal that had been agreed to — yet apparently deeply misunderstood — protect President Joe Biden's son from future charges.
As Griff Jenkins explained on Fox News Channel, the judge was — understandably — not willing to give Hunter some sort of get out of jail free card that extended into the future.
Fox News' @GriffJenkins has the latest info on Hunter Biden's plea deal falling apart:
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) July 26, 2023
"This deal would possibly give Hunter some immunity to future charges, and [the judge] is not okay with that." pic.twitter.com/ITY9gZSCjN
This is a developing story and may be updated.