The defense had to argue that even though Hunter Biden was clearly experiencing crack addiction during this general time, he was not using during the 11-day period when he bought and owned the gun.

Jurors evidently found that implausible, given evidence including a text message where he stated he was “sleeping on a car smoking crack” two days after the gun purchase.

Hallie Biden told the court she found the gun in Hunter Biden’s car, along with “remnants of crack cocaine” and drug paraphernalia.

Conservatives initially reacted to Hunter Biden’s guilty verdict by largely choosing one of two conspiracies: that Biden’s conviction is an offering from the Department of Justice to weaken outrage over Trump’s conviction, or that Biden’s gun conviction is simply smoke and mirrors to distract from the (very false) allegation that Joe Biden took a bribe to coerce the Ukrainian government away from investigating a gas company whose board Hunter Biden sat on.

Marjorie Taylor Greene has opted to blend these two together, posting well after the initial surge of hot takes that Hunter Biden is “the Deep State’s sacrificial lamb.”

It will likely never occur to those circulating these conspiracies that Trump’s conviction in the hush-money trial came from a city-level investigation unaffiliated with the Justice Department, which began more than a year before Biden announced his bid for president.

Among fervent defenders of the Second Amendment, some argue that drug users should not be prohibited from owning firearms — an argument that would render the prosecution of the Hunter Biden unconstitutional.

Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) wrote on social media: “Hunter might deserve to be in jail for something, but purchasing a gun is not it.”

Massie added: “There are millions of marijuana users who own guns in this country, and none of them should be in jail for purchasing or possessing a firearm against current laws.”