On this date in 2014, 2015, 2016, as well as 2017, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” published profiles of the U.S. House Representative from New York’s 2nd Congressional District, Peter King, a repeated fear-monger of practitioners of Islam in America, who has insisted that among American Muslims there is a “looming threat”, in a manner that makes the late Sen. Joe McCarthy give a thumbs up from beyond the grave. In 2016, Rep. King called for 24/7 surveillance of all mosques in the United States, which would be a simultaneous violation of both the 1st and 4th Amendments. King is also one of the biggest defenders of the CIA torturing detainees at Guantanamo Bay Prison, and has tried defending it by lying and saying the intel that led to the United States locating and killing Osama bin Laden was acquired by waterboarding prisoners (it wasn’t). Rep. King contradicted the CIA’s torture report by saying, “no one was severely hurt” by the practices because no one was cut or stabbed. But the fact that Peter King is willing to fabricate stories to push his agenda should come as little surprise, when you consider he literally dismissed CNN anchor Soledad O’Brien for correcting him in an interview by yelling at her, “I DON’T CARE WHAT FACT-CHECK SAYS.” This also came into play in our second look at Congressman King, who blamed the death of Eric Garner not on police, but on Garner for being obese. He also once gave an interview where he referred to the Japanese as the racial slur “Japs”, and refused to apologize for doing so.
In his latest time out as a Congressman, he’s tackling the issues that really matter to Americans like… ah, we’re just kidding… he’s been dedicating most of his energy towards attacking members of the intelligence community and the press for investigating, and reporting on Donald Trump’s presidential campaign colluding with Russia to win the presidency in the 2016 election. Back in December of 2016, he actually was suggesting that it was just “rogue” CIA officers claiming the Russians hacked the election. Which in hindsight, makes him look really stupid since every single agency in our intelligence community agree the Russians were influencing our election. They have them on tape talking about it in intercepts while they did it, there’s been numerous confirmed meetings between Trump campaign officials and Russians, and of course now after the fact, there are people in the Russian government literally bragging about what they did on Russian television.
So, hey, maybe we should get on preventing the Russians from interfering in future elections, like immediately, right? Maybe Peter King would like to do something about that? Well, apparently as long as he and members of his party win, he could give a s***, as he’s been using hearings to discuss the matter to instead complain that information is reaching the media via “leaks”. He has continued carrying water for Trump and his cronies at every opportunity to cast doubt on the investigators, including within the past week or so when he was justifying Donald Trump releasing all the information about the FBI’s investigation of Carter Page using a FISA warrant in spite of Trump admitting he didn’t even read what classified information he released.
This is a man who is supposedly the GOP’s top guy on national security, incidentally. We’ll note that this is also the same man who tried hand-waving away outrage over the Trump administration’s family separation policy on immigration in June 2018, unfazed about children being locked in cages by ICE or the potential fallout from it, being quoted as saying, “Americans care more about Americans.”
Again, if you aren’t American enough to Peter King, you’re not even really a human being.
Now, Peter King has spent the past two decades portraying himself as the ultimate patriot and that anyone who disagrees with his extreme views on terrorism are just not committed to loving America as much as he does. That pattern held all the way into May 2018, where as the owner of the New York Jets announced he would not punish players who took a knee during the national anthem to protest police violence in our country, Peter King lost his goddamned mind, and compared players kneeling during the anthem to “giving Nazi salutes” in a response on Twitter that also declared it was “time to say goodbye to the Jets”. When Rep. King was criticized from many angles for his comments, he, of course, doubled down on them.
If this all weren’t aggravating enough, there’s still Peter King’s voting record to think of.
- March 28th, 2017: Rep. King votes for SJ Res 34, which allowed internet providers to sell the data information of their customers’ internet usage to businesses. Well, so much for privacy.
- May 4th, 2017: King votes for the House GOP’s healthcare plan, that would kick roughly 24 million people off their health insurance plans, allow up to 28,000 more people to die a year, give $50,000 in tax breaks to millionaires, and would eliminate coverage for pre-existing conditions which would include such medical conditions as pregnancy (current or past), postpartum depression, or prior sexual assault. Oh, and a provision in the bill would make sure that King would be allowed to keep his healthcare plan as it exists under the ACA, which would be repealed for the rest of the country. He and his Republican compatriots threw themselves a beer bash to celebrate taking away healthcare from millions and then gloated about it with Donald Trump at a White House press conference, as well.
- June 8th, 2017: Peter King votes for HR 10, the GOP’s attempt to repeal Dodd-Frank financial reform, because what the country really needs is to allow the big banks to make the same mistakes that imploded the economy only a decade earlier.
- September 8th, 2017: Rep. King chooses to be one of 90 Republicans in Congress who votes against disaster relief for Hurricane Harvey.
- October 3rd, 2017: King votes for HR 36, the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, that would try to create an unconstitutional ban abortion at 20 weeks (even though medical science tells us fetuses do not have the capability to feel pain until 29 weeks).
- February 18th, 2018: Peter King and his fellow Republicans decide that poor big businesses are suffering too much at the hands of the Americans with Disabilities Act too much, and vote for HR 620, which would strip most of the civil rights protections guaranteed by it.
Now, Peter King outperforms the Cook Partisan Voting Index lean for his district, which supposedly has a +3 Republican lean, and as revelations continue to come out about the Trump campaign colluding with Russia… Peter King’s efforts to defend people who committed treason could easily provide fuel for an upset in what should be a swing district. No amount of demonizing Muslim Americans (which, incidentally is something harder to do during the era of Trump’s Muslim ban, which King supports, but runs away from any responsibility for) might be able to keep him afloat.
Hopefully, he doesn’t get a fourteenth term in office, and the Democrat coming for him is Liuba Grechen Shirley, an inspiring mother of two who has worked for the United Nations Foundation, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, EastWest Institute, Vital Voices, and New York University, and who made news for being the first American political candidate to make the argument, and win, to have campaign funding be accepted to be used on child care while campaigning. When you also add in that she live-blogged her immigrant husband’s citizenship announcement on Facebook, and he got it done in time to vote for her… she’s pretty hard not to like. Especially given that we here at CSGOPOTD kinda are tired of Peter King’s bulls***.