We still cannot believe Sen. James Lankford of Oklahoma is a senator and not a missing annoying neighbor from a sitcom.
In 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, as well as 2020, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” published profiles of U.S. Senator James Lankford of Oklahoma, a former pastor who has referred to same sex marriage as “an attack upon the family” while campaigning for office, thinks being gay is a choice, refers to climate change a myth, spoke at length about his frustration of endangered birds receiving more protection from the government than fetuses, blamed the Sandy Hook Massacre on “welfare moms overmedicating their kids to get more benefits” and in June of 2016 against a measure that would have made it illegal for firearms transfers to people who were suspected terrorists on the “no fly list”. His Christian principles lead him to believe migrant children should be thrown out of the country because in the Bible, being kind to strangers doesn’t specify that they should be citizens of the country you live in. Seriously, this guy is such a fanatic when he was asked about the national debt, his solution was to pray that it gets better.
He has spent years pushing for “religious freedom” legislation because he defines no being allowed to discriminate against gay people as “being targeted for his faith”, claiming they are the real victims in a “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” situation. Lankford’s also prolifically absent in Congress when it comes time to vote, as he missed almost 10% of them from his final term serving in the House. Near the end of our 2015 entry about Lankford, we noted he had found himself amongst the #47Traitors, for writing a letter to the leaders of Iran trying to undermine the peace treaty that the Obama administration had arranged with them, and was campaigning to push for national “religious freedom” laws to allow for the discrimination of LGBTQ citizens and prevent them from having equal rights based on the supposed faith of who was discriminating against them. He has also voted to defund Planned Parenthood, voted to maintain the gun rights of people on the no-fly list so they could procure firearms for mass shootings, voted to try and block Syrian refugees from being resettled in the United States, and refused to consider Merrick Garland for the Supreme Court because “he isn’t conservative enough”, waiting a year to vote for Neil Gorsuch.
Since we last updated our annual look at James Lankford, he has made several troubling votes, including continuing to vote for every Trump administration nominee, no matter how unqualified or utterly appalling (including torture maven Gina Haspel to be the head of the COA), he voted against disaster relief funding for victims of Hurricane Harvey back in October of 2017, and in December of 2017, he voted for the big GOP Tax Plan/Scam that benefited only the top 1% of the country.
For all that party line bulls***, does Sen. Lankford get any love from the White House. HA! No. Trump doesn’t even know his name, he calls him “Tom”. And yet… he still blindly supports him, by doing things like vote for Donald Trump’s supposed “national emergency” on the U.S./Mexico border.
Or in other key votes:
- February 14th, 2019: Lankford votes to approve the nomination of William Barr to be the country’s Attorney General, even though he was involved in the Iran-Contra scandal in the 1980s. (SPOILER ALERT: He’s still crooked as a snake with scoliosis).
- January 31st, 2020: Sen. Lankford votes against witnesses being allowed in the impeachment trial of Donald Trump, effectively making it a “trial”.
- February 5th, 2020: James Lankford votes against the first impeachment of Donald Trump, in spite of the mountain of evidence showing that he solicited foreign assistance in the 2020 elections by withholding Congressionally approved military aid from Ukraine.
- February 25th, 2020: Lankford co-sponsors and votes for the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, an insane piece of anti-choice legislation that would ask abortion providers to try to admit aborted fetuses to a hospital if they were “alive” after the procedure, which is medically impossible given the age that abortions can be performed at.
- February 13th, 2021: Sen. Lankford votes against the second impeachment of Donald Trump, because accountability for inciting a violent coup attempt is somehow anathema to the majority of the Republican Party.
- March 6th, 2021: Lankford votes against the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, because he can’t be bothered to care if people need financial assistance during a pandemic.
James Lankford spent most of the Covid-19 pandemic fretting about the fact that people received any of their stimulus money, opining that they were being given a “disincentivize” from going back to work, and that a $1200 payment was “too generous”.
Because we know a pastor must have read the Bible and learned all the important lessons where Jesus thumbed his nose at the poor and sick. BUT SPEAKING OF PASTORS… Lankford has a 2022 GOP Primary challenger for his Senate seat, and it’s… another pastor! But before you go thinking there’s a Republican with a conscience to actually tout the hypocrisy Lankford has shown as a Christian… James Lahmeyer, his 29 year old challenger, is endorsed by the pardoned Trump-aligned felon, former General Michael Flynn, and will be attacking Lankford for not being loyal ENOUGH to Donald Trump.
Don’t get us wrong, we would love for the Senate to be rid of James Lankford but… not like that. Please, not like that.
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