When House Republicans issued a subpoena to Hunter Biden three weeks ago, it was far from surprising. President Joe Biden’s son has been at the center of GOP conspiracy theories for quite a while, and it was inevitable that the party would take this step.

Shortly thereafter, Hunter Biden’s lawyer, Abbe Lowell, issued a statement deriding the subpoena as “yet another political stunt aimed at distracting from the glaring failure of [House Oversight Committee Chair James] Comer and his MAGA allies to prove a single one of their wild and now discredited conspiracies about the Biden family.”

But the same statement went on to note that Hunter Biden still welcomed the opportunity to speak to the GOP-led committee “in a public forum and at the right time.”

Three weeks later, the use of the word “public” is relevant anew. NBC News reported:

Hunter Biden is open to testifying publicly before the Republican-led House Oversight Committee on Dec. 13, his lawyer said in a letter sent to the panel Tuesday. House Republicans subpoenaed the president’s son early this month and summoned him to appear for a closed-door transcribed interview as part of an escalation of Republicans’ impeachment inquiry into the president.

“We have seen you use closed-door sessions to manipulate, even distort the facts and misinform the public. We therefore propose opening the door,” Lowell said in his latest correspondence with Comer.

The attorney raised a legitimate point. Comer and his colleagues have spent months playing fast and loose with closed-door testimony, cherry-picking quotes as part of a clumsy partisan crusade. With this in mind, Lowell doesn’t trust Republicans on the Oversight Committee to deal with the matter responsibly, so he suggested letting some sunshine in: Let everyone, including the media and the public, see both the questions and the answers.

In theory, this seemed like the sort of thing GOP members would immediately embrace. Why not create a public spectacle? Why not let Americans see the grilling that Republicans are eager to subject the presidential son to?

But in practice, it’s apparently not working out that way: Comer rejected the idea of a public hearing, declaring that Hunter Biden would have to answer questions behind closed doors, far from view.

“Let me get this straight,” Rep. Jamie Raskin, the ranking member of the Oversight Committee, said in a statement. “After wailing and moaning for 10 months about Hunter Biden and alluding to some vast unproven family conspiracy, after sending Hunter Biden a subpoena to appear and testify, Chairman Comer and the Oversight Republicans now reject his offer to appear before the full Committee and the eyes of the world and to answer any questions that they pose?

“What an epic humiliation for our colleagues and what a frank confession that they are simply not interested in the facts and have no confidence in their own case or the ability of their own Members to pursue it. After the miserable failure of their impeachment hearing in September, Chairman Comer has now apparently decided to avoid all Committee hearings where the public can actually see for itself the logical, rhetorical and factual contortions they have tied themselves up in.”

The Maryland Democrat concluded, “What the Republicans fear most is sunlight and the truth.”

By way of a defense, Comer appeared on Fox News again nearly 12 hours ago, insisting that a closed-door Q&A that the public won’t be allowed to watch is “for all practical purposes public.”

At this point, it’s probably worth reminding the Kentucky Republican that “public” and “private” are not synonyms.