There are multiple reports Monday night that Special Counsel Robert Hur, who investigated Joe Biden's handling of classified documents, is no longer a Department of Justice employee and will be testifying at a House Judiciary Committee hearing as a private citizen.

The Independent, known as a reliable lefty rag, published a story based on anonymous sources claiming that Hur "arranged his departure from the Department of Justice to be official as of Monday 11 March," specifically so he would not be "bound by the ethical guidelines which govern the behaviour of federal prosecutors" when testifying. According to the story, Hur has also "surrounded himself with Republican partisans and notorious figures linked to former president Donald Trump" in preparation for the testimony.

Those "Republican partisans and notorious figures" linked to Trump are allegedly attorney Bill Burck and former head of the DOJ's Office of Public Affairs, Sarah Isgur.

But there are a few problems with the story. Isgur, now a writer at The Dispatch, is hardly a fan of Trump, and she denies "prepping" Hur for his testimony as the Independent alleges. She has publicly said that Hur reached out to her for help and that she considered it, but that she ended up not assisting. Isgur wrote on X:

.@AndrewFeinberg never reached out to me to confirm his story. If he had, I would have told him that I had zero role in preparing Hur for his congressional testimony. Do better journalism, please.

Burck represented three members of the Trump administration during the Russia collusion hoax investigation, but he's been a respected Republican attorney for decades. If Burck actually does represent Hur during his congressional testimony, that's hardly surprising or a problem; does anyone really think a Democrat attorney in Washington, D.C. would agree to represent Hur?

Another problem with the Independent's story is that a report from Max Cohen of Punchbowl News contradicts the timeline. Cohen says that Hur left the DOJ last week - not Monday, March 11 - as confirmed to him by a DOJ spokesperson, and that he left because he finished his work as special counsel, not as part as some leftist fan fiction.

Hur left the DOJ last week after finishing his work as special counsel https://t.co/UIrRJWK97H

— Max Cohen (@maxpcohen) March 12, 2024

Now there are a spate of stories piggybacking off the Independent's faulty original story, so by Tuesday morning the fake narrative of Hur quitting as part of a partisan "Gotcha!" scheme and being propped up by Trump puppets will be everywhere, and Democrats will use that to distract from the extremely damaging issue at hand.