26.10.2 Schmitt Happens MAGA style
26.10.2 Schmitt Happens MAGA style
Being from Missouri, I have a vested interest in the two senators representing my state, as embarrassing as they are. Usually it’s Josh Hawley attempting a grandstanding moment to keep in MAGAs good graces. This time, junior senator Eric Schmitt made national news with one of the most cringeworthy appearances before Congress.
Let’s set the stage. Donald Trump’s second term is on a revenge mission. The Schmitt-Smith exchange pretty much sums up how it’s going. The public is not amused, although comedians have struck gold justifiably ridiculing Schmitt.
Missouri senator Eric Schmitt embarrassed himself and the MAGAsphere with his stupidity. He tried to get Jack Smith, special prosecutor on Trump’s collusion over trying to undo the 2020 election by saying it was rigged. Schmitt was warned that the texts he used to accuse former Jack Smith of perjury were unvetted. Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee cautioned Schmitt ahead of Smith's testimony that the Justice Department texts had not been verified. Schmitt went ahead and used them anyway.
Committee Chair Chuck Grassley's (R-IA) team put together a memo on key information for the hearing but left the texts out of it. Grassley also didn't give the texts to Democratic senators in advance. That only deepens the Democrats' suspicion that congressional Republicans and the Trump administration were working together to undermine or trap Smith.
Schmitt: Did you go to an NBA game between the Golden State Warriors and the Atlanta Hawks on February 3rd, 2024?
Jack Smith: What city would that be in?
Schmitt: Atlanta.
Smith: No.
Schmitt: Okay. Is it your testimony that you were not in Atlanta on February 3rd, 2024?
Smith: I do not believe so. I definitely did not go to a Hawks game.
Schmitt: Did you ever meet Nathan Wade or Fani Willis in your time as special counsel?
Smith: No.
Schmitt: What would you say if I had a series of text messages from your team that said you were in Atlanta at a Warriors-Hawks game on February 3rd, 2024 — the day after Willis and Wade announced their affair? I don’t think you know that we have this stuff, so I’ll give you a second to process it so you don’t perjure yourself.
Smith: I recall going to a University of Maryland basketball game where Caitlin Clark was playing right around that time, and the Marshals Service was there with me. You could check if that was the exact date. It was Maryland playing Iowa, I think, in February of 2024. But again, you could check that out if that’s what we’re talking about.
Schmitt: We have confirmed that, in fact, you were right, Mr. Smith. Iowa — the Iowa Hawkeyes — played Maryland on February 3rd, 2024.
Schmitt: You may think you’re the hero in this story, but let me tell you something: You’re the villain. You’ve done so much damage. As a former prosecutor, I can say there’s so much damage to the trust and faith people have in our system. You have weaponized the Department of Justice against political enemies to an extent that has never happened in the history of this country. You will go down as a total dirtbag. You will go down as a total dirtbag. I yield my time.
←– From the New York Times
Turns out Smith was at an Iowa Hawkeye’s game to see Caitlan Clark play, not an Atlanta Hawks game.
Senator Amy Klobuchar caught the mistake and let Schmitt have it.
“I would just say for a U.S. senator to have false information and imply, based on a confusion about the name of a team, which I knew, knowing my Midwestern sports, and imply that you were in another city, that you were somehow involved that day in what was happening in Georgia and then call you a dirtbag is something that deserves an apology.”
Shocker, Schmitt never apologized. He openly accused a person of perjury and called him a dirtbag based on erroneous information. His own party warned him that it hadn’t been vetted and his people would need to confirm it. But that’s not what MAGA does. MAGA runs over all opposition, reality be damned, and continues, no matter what ridiculous rabbit hole they fall into.
All Schmitt had to do was admit he made a mistake. But that’s not the Trumpian way. No, the Trumpian way is to press further, increasing the stupidity level to everyone else.
Schmitt’s insinuation was that Smith was in Atlanta to improperly collude with Willis and coordinate their investigations into Trump.
Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn, confirmed during her questioning of Smith that the Iowa Hawkeyes had played in Maryland on Feb. 3, 2024. So, Schmitt, being a typical MAGA who never lets facts stand in the way, falsely accused Smith of collusion with Willis because he didn’t bother to dig deeper. Not knowing the difference between the Atlanta Hawks and the Iowa Hawkeyes was a pretty egregious blunder.
“I think people should have their facts straight before they accuse people of being a ‘dirtbag’ and not get the teams wrong” Klobuchar said after pointing out the obvious mistake between recognizing which team Smith went to see. For a collegiate athlete in the midwest, not realizing Iowa was the Hawkeyes was egregious.
Heather Cox Richardson brilliantly summed it up.
Senator Eric Schmitt (R-MO) launched a hit on Smith, setting up the idea he was part of a conspiracy with Fulton County, Georgia, district attorney Fani Willis and her colleague Nathan Wade to persecute Trump.
Schmitt “Did you go to an NBA game between the Golden State Warriors and the Atlanta Hawks on February 3, 2024?”
Smith looked confused at the bizarre turn in questioning and asked Schmitt to repeat the question. Schmitt did, and asked him if he had ever been to Atlanta during his time as special counsel.
Smith answered “I really don't think so. It’s possible I flew through the Atlanta airport on the way to Florida, but I do not have a recollection of going to Atlanta. I definitely did not go to a Hawks game. I’m sure of that.”
Schmitt quickly flashed a poster board of a text exchange about Smith going to a basketball game. Smith countered with, “You just took it down really quick. If I could look at that again?”
Schmitt, now awash in smuggery, answered, “We’ll put it in a file. You can respond. I think you’ve already perjured yourself.” Schmitt was in the mind numbing process of railroading without looking both ways.
Smith’s answer, “if this is the correct basketball game, I recall going to a University of Maryland basketball game where Caitlin Clark was playing right around that time…. You could check if that was the exact date. It was Maryland playing Iowa, I think, February of 2024.”
At that point Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) figured it out. Schmitt was accusing Smith of being in Atlanta at an Atlanta Hawks game, where he could hypothetically have met up with Willis and Wade. In reality, he was in Maryland at a game in which Maryland played the University of Iowa: the Hawkeyes.
Klobuchar addressed Schmitt: “Could it then be that University of Iowa’s the Hawkeyes, could that be it, and maybe before we show this kind of thing…that might be the confusion over the names of the team but perhaps you should’ve looked at it more carefully….”
Schmitt MAGAfied the moment by exploding, accusing Klobuchar of “trying to rehabilitate the witness.”
“You had the teams wrong, sir,” Klobuchar told Schmitt.
Newscasters who reviewed tapes of the games found Smith in the stands at the Maryland game.
Hunter Walker of Talking Points Memo notes that the Atlanta State Farm Arena uses letters to denote rows in section 109 rather than numbers. The University of Maryland arena uses numbers.
After embarrassing himself in a high-profile Senate hearing, Schmitt spoke to Capitol Hill reporters and pretended that his line of inquiry was legitimate. Asked if he believed Smith had perjured himself, Schmitt, indifferent to the fact that he had confused the Atlanta Hawks and the Iowa Hawkeyes, said, “We’ll find out.”
Schmitt added, “My job here today was to ask questions and get answers.” Silly me, I thought part of the job was to be well informed, knowledgeable, and accurate.
Schmitt wasn’t there to ask questions, he was there to perform a little show, complete with a juvenile poster board, with the clear intention of trapping Smith. Schmitt never thought about what if Smith had gone to a basketball game in Atlanta, that wouldn’t have meant he was secretly in cahoots with Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, which was the point Schmitt was trying to make.
Schmitt not only continued to insist that he hadn’t made a mistake, he even appeared on a far-right talk show and pretended that nothing had gone wrong.
I hope this haunts Schmitt for the rest of his public life.
What’s embarrassing for me is that my fellow Missourians voted this idiot to the senate. Ever since Obama ran for president Missouri has gone from a bellwether state that almost always voted for the presidential winner to a blind thoroughly Republican state. I have been disappointed that this turn happened because there were so many closeted racists in Missouri.
Let’s not gloss over the other Missouri senator making a fool of himself. On Sean Hannity’s show, Hawley stated that Smith went through Melania Trump’s “personal drawers.” Problem is Smith was appointed special counsel months after the Aug. 8, 2022, FBI search of Mar-a-Lago in connection with the classified documents scandal. In other words, much like teh Atlanta Hawks game, Smith was not there.
MAGA never lets anything like pesky facts or thorough research stand in the way of a huge lie to prove their erroneous point.
References
GOP’s Eric Schmitt keeps digging after falling into a ditch of his own making by Steve Benen
Josh Hawley Commits Another Cringe GOP Error In Attacking Jack Smith by Ron Dicker
Jack Smith Gets Falsely Accused After GOP Senator Confuses Atlanta Hawks With Iowa Hawkeyes by Alison Durkee
GOP senator ridiculed as cameras catch her look of 'utter horror' in Jack Smith hearing By Bennito L. Kelty,
Eric Schmitt was warned about unvetted Jack Smith 'gotcha' texts before blunder By Bennito L. Kelty
Heather Cox Richardson’s Blog
Sen. Eric Schmitt Might Have Been A MAGA Hero If He Wasn’t Such A MAGA Moron [Op-Ed]
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